No Light, No Light (Not A Glimmer Of Light)
by Celesteennui
Summary: Oil and water, fire and ice, chickens and boots; all of these things mix far better than Sparrow does with Reaver. Somehow though, she's tied to him, by fate as well as choice. And, as always, the choices that she makes come with repercussions that aren't solely her own to bear. Sparrow/Reaver with Reaver as the biological father to Logan and the Princess/Hero of Brightwall.
1. Never Knew Daylight Could Be So Violent

**Disclaimer:** I don't own a thing.

* * *

**1.**

Sparrow is Good, true. But Pure? Not so much.

She likes helping people and she does always strive to do the right thing but pure isn't what she would describe herself as being in the slightest. "Pure" is a word that brings to mind people who are afraid of so much as a wink, people who back away at the sight of too much skin. Sparrow has not been anything near to pure since she was fifteen. Desires, lustful thoughts, she has those and readily gives into them; after all, what's the point of being alive if you aren't going to live?

Still, she should know better than to fall into bed with Reaver. He's hard to resist, though, especially after a few drinks. His laugh rakes her backbone in the most delicious way and the way he looks at her, as if she's the only one in the tavern, it's…Well, it isn't unpleasant, that's for sure. Even Heroes have needs after all, and it's been ages since she had someone. Avo's Shinning Ass, Alex has been gone nearly six years…

Their coupling is more like a fight than a roll in the sheets. Given Reaver's nature is to push and Sparrow's is to push back harder, that's scarcely a surprise. And besides, she enjoys a good fight.

When Reaver's teeth skim her neck, Sparrow claws his back. He shrieks, high-pitched as a noblewoman, as her nails sink into the flesh of his backside. He also thrusts harder, managing to find that spot that makes her see stars when he does. Each time that they kiss, there's blood, coppery and sweet. Reaver tastes like a summer morning in Bowerstone Cemetery, like loss liberally peppered with sunshine.

She loses count of how many times they have at one another. Sparrow recalls her legs being over his shoulders, gripping the headboard, and burying her face into the pillows multiple times. Her wrists are bruised from being held above her head and her thighs are red from the friction created by the frantic work of Reaver's hips locked in their vice. Purple-red marks that perfectly match Sparrow's fingers ring his neck and he'll carry the imprint of her teeth on his left shoulder blade for weeks. It's dirty, and wrong, and absolute bliss.

She leaves at dawn before he wakes—or at least before she _thinks_ he's awake. Reaver's eyes stay shut and he makes no move or sound when Sparrow disentangles herself to grab her clothes. Exiting his quarters, she is sore but highly satisfied and, while far from being happy she would go so far as to say that she is content. For now at least.

She will also call herself an idiot later on for thinking that it could remain an isolated incident.

**2.**

Reaver might be the Hero of Skill, but that doesn't mean Sparrow can't be quick enough to get the drop on him just once. He loses his fancy feathered hat to the tiny crossbow that she keeps at her waist when he shows up at the Bowerstone Gala six years after that first night. Luckily, he approaches her in one of the secluded sections of the garden so she doesn't terrify any citizens when she pegs said hat.

"Well, you could simply have asked me to leave you know," he says raising an eyebrow, grinning like a demon.

_Like_, that's a watered down comparison. And probably an insult to demons.

"I wouldn't think that I should need to," she replies. Out comes her pistol. "Garth wrote me about your little tavern adventure. Must I really explain why that makes you persona non grata?"

He shrugs, not put off in the slightest. "I didn't think you'd particularly care. You two never struck me as being very close. And, may I remind you: I did not kill him." Picking up his hat, Reaver pulls the little bolt from it, removing one of the big feathers in the process. _That _makes him pout. "Ugh. I stole this from a Courtesan in the Eastern Kingdom; it's one of a kind."

"Was," Sparrow corrects. She hasn't lowered her pistol. "What do you want, Reaver?"

Laughing, he puts his hat back on, sans feather, and strolls closer. "Oh, I was only in the neighborhood. One Hero checking up on another. Is that not allowed?"

Another laugh comes at her deadpan stare. He steps forward, he's not particularly quick, but he still manages to sidestep her pistol. Sparrow's pulse hammers but not from fear. This close she can smell him, smoke, cloves, and perfume that was probably mixed for a woman. The scent brings back every sensation from the night they shared almost two years ago and arousal all but slams her center.

As if he smells her desire, his grin deepens. Those even white teeth gleam; a predator baring fangs to prey. Sparrow is no lamb waiting for slaughter but she's certainly paralyzed as one might be. She notices that his gloves are fingerless, black satin stitched with scarlet as two knuckles glide down her temple and jaw then lightly pinch her chin.

"Favor me with a dance?" It isn't really a question.

She also knows that she made up her mind about the second she saw him, conscious of it though she wasn't.

Returning the pistol to its holster that's sewn into her bodice, Sparrow holds her free hand out to Reaver. He takes it, feigning the perfect gentleman, and pulling her just flush enough to jab propriety.

Hammer would smack her in the head. Avo's mercy, Sparrow does miss her best friend. Hammer is not there, however, so Sparrow ignores all good sense. She dances most of the night with Reaver then accompanies him to the lavish rooms he's taken at the inn. Two days are lost in his sheets and arms before Sparrow's sense of duty kicks in and she extracts herself, again leaving while Reaver appears to be fast asleep.

**3.**

They see each other frequently enough for some time after that; three years in all, give or take. Every few weeks Reaver shows up in her manse, making the servants nervous. Honestly, Sparrow prefers it that way; the less fond that her employees are of Reaver the more likely they are to stay out of his way and not to question her about him.

She doesn't ask why he's staying around, because, honestly, she would just rather not know. Morality isn't Reaver's forte and Sparrow has enough to deal with as more and more of Albion turns to her for leadership.

He's great stress-relief, really. Most of the time.

"So who is this Turner fellow?" he asks one night/very early morning as they enjoy the new sunken floor tub she's had installed in her private bath.

Sparrow doesn't open her eyes; for a wiry fellow, Reaver has a very comfortable chest. She does, however, flick a handful of water into his face. "Stop reading my letters."

"Stop leaving them out in the open," he counters.

"Inside of my desk is _not_ 'out in the open', Reaver."

"It is when the desk isn't one with a decent lock." Soap bubbles land on her nose, a retaliation. Sparrow still doesn't open her eyes; instead, she turns her head and wipes the residue away on his collarbone. "And don't deflect, who is he?"

"Not that it concerns you, but he's looking for help with getting things under control around here," Sparrow tells him. "Say what you will about Lucien, but the crazy, murdering bastard _was_ a figurehead. People go a little off when there's no one to at least feign a semblance of order."

"Ah," Reaver says. "So you're making a bid for the crown. Good show."

She opens her eyes when he says that. He's smirking, the glass of wine he carried in from her bedroom dangling from his fingers.

"That's jumping the gun a bit, don't you think?" She steals the glass, ignoring the scowl tossed her way, and takes a sip before handing it back.

"Well, as many guns as you've jumped, both figurative and in front of—"

"Ha. Ha."

"—not really, no." His smirk deepens and he drains last of the wine. "Don't take offense; you'd be decent at it. You're not terribly stupid for a goody-two-shoes, and the common folk just eat the 'Hero' bit up. It's a fairly sound notion."

Sparrow shakes her head. "I'm _of_ the common folk. The nobility wouldn't have it."

"Then you make them accept it," he says. There's no humor in his blue eyes, no smile on his face, just an intense, honest light. How many have seen this look and survived? It seems the kind that would precede a ship boarding or a village burning.

It doesn't frighten Sparrow, though it probably should. As old as Reaver is, he _would_ know a thing or two about power. Just because his methods differ from hers doesn't invalidate them. In theory, anyway. Practice is another matter.

Sparrow resumes her previous position and shuts her eyes. "Unless there's a lot more wine, I'm not in the mood to discuss politics, Reaver."

"Of course, my dear, of course."

She'll look back on the mocking lilt of his words later, when the Beck lad, Sol Turner, and Jacky Swift have all but convinced her that her head was made for a crown, and wonder if Reaver has been back to the Spire. He certainly acts as if her ascension was laid out in cards.

**4.**

It happens on what should be an uneventful rendezvous in the northern countryside. She, Walter, and Swift are on their way to deal with a Hobbe problem that Lady Martin has had as well as to discuss her possible support. Only it turns out there is no Hobbe problem and support is the last thing from Lady Martin that Sparrow shall have. At least that's what she gathers from the ambush waiting for them just inside the boundary of Martin's lands.

The battle itself is no problem. They defeat the lady's guards and hired thugs soundly, with no casualties to their side. Or at that was what Sparrow thought at first. When the ache that she has from a smart kick to her belly doesn't abate and blood starts pooling in her trousers, however, she has to rethink that.

That's how she finds out that she was pregnant.

Well, she finds out later; she collapses shortly after all of the blood comes. There are spotty moments in between falling to the ground in that field and true consciousness days later. Poor little Jasper fretting and pressing compresses to her forehead. Arguing followed by pistol-fire. The soothing voice of a doctor and Walter's grumbling.

Just over a month, the doctor tells her when she's come to. She can still have children but there was regrettably nothing he could do to save this one.

In the numbness that follows being told she carried then lost a life before she even knew about it, Sparrow can't say that she's overly disappointed. She is not ready for that kind of responsibility. One day, in the not-too-far-removed future, she wants it, she's sure. When she does decide to have children however, she wants to be the kind of mother who is around, who teaches, who dries tears, and chases nightmares away. Before she can be that, she has a crown to forge.

She intends to start by putting Elmira Martin's head on a pike. Unfortunately, that first step is truncated when no one can find the miserable bitch. Her whole household seems to have gone on the run; her manse is vacant when Sparrow leads her troops to storm it.

Retreat turns out not to be the reality of Lady Martin's absence though. As she searches the master bedroom, Sparrow finds the truth. A fortune card, a bloody, cracked mirror with a rose, is settled in plain sight on the vanity. The Thief has beaten her here.

**5.**

Albion is all but under Sparrow's belt the next time that she and Reaver meet. Eight years later, all that stands between her and her coronation is her marriage to Lord Thomas Danforth. Thomas, a very likable and handsome fellow, comes from one of Albion's oldest bloodlines. Not as old as her Archon bloodline of course, but Sparrow keeps that to herself. It will stop the old cows from fussing too much if they're allowed to believe one of theirs holds her ear.

Fate deems it appropriate that Reaver returns on her wedding day.

"I heard it was happening but I scarce believed it true. The Hero of Bowerstone is to wed. Enchanting."

What's most surprising to Sparrow is that she isn't even startled by him. Eight years and she is _still_ used to Reaver popping up whenever he wants, wherever he wants, even including her dressing room as she prepares for the ceremony. She does, however, throw a scowl his way through her vanity mirror. She's too busy arranging her hair to turn and do it to his face.

"If you killed Jasper or any of my guards to get in, you're going to spend the rest of your immortal life missing some very pleasurable but non-vital pieces."

"Perish the thought," he says. "I would never sully your special day with blood. Not unless you asked."

"Hmm…" She pins an errant curl back.

"You know, most queens have maids for that sort of thing," he says. Sparrow notices him idling closer in the rear of the mirror's reflection. "Especially for impressive events."

"How handy it is that I'm not a queen yet." She turns just as he steps into the circle of her personal space.

He looks younger than he did eight years ago; Lady Martin's household positively glutted the Shadow Court, no doubt, and will for some time. She's not sorry about that, not like she should be.

Hands are sliding along her thighs, rucking up the lacy hem of her slip. Reaver hasn't taken his gloves off; the silk feels delicious. Still, she has to protest just on principle.

"What happened to not sullying the day?" Sparrow asks even as she slides her arms around his neck.

"With blood," he reminds her. "Sullying the bride herself is another matter entirely." In one smooth motion, he's lifted her onto the vanity's edge tugged her smallclothes out of the way. Two-hundred years or so leaves plenty of time to perfect things and Sparrow, despite her best efforts is impressed by it. And aroused.

Their tryst is a quick one, it has to be given that she's so shortly to be married, but that doesn't make it any less enjoyable. Reaver helps her to right herself afterward, even lacing up her gown and painting her face. He also offers Sparrow something "borrowed" for the occasion, a lovely white-gold and sapphire ring with the initials E.L.M. engraved in delicate cursive along the sides.

She takes the trophy and dances with Reaver three times during the reception. He never asks for it to be returned.

**6.**

While Sparrow may not be in love with her husband, she does love him as a friend and he isn't bad in bed. The three years she shares with Thomas are happy ones. He manages her household well, keeping the castle in order while she takes care of business as it is. More importantly, Thomas never gets in her way, with politics, policy, or personal affairs. For that courtesy alone, Sparrow never beds Reaver in the castle, though she does assign Thomas' mistress, an ingenious young lady named Marcella, the quarters adjacent to his.

It's a decision that seems to irritate Reaver, probably because it means he's never there to be invited to Marcella's bed along with her and Thomas. To make it up to him, Sparrow invites him along with her to Brightwall when she begins construction of her new academy. The gesture backfires, just a bit.

"This is a waste of coin," he says for the thousandth time one evening month or so into the excursion. She's busy budgeting construction while he complains. The scorn on his pretty face would frighten others; Sparrow however, smiles into her glass of wine and continues making notes. "What is there to be gained from _giving_ such a wealth away?"

She shrugs, delighting in the way it makes him flush. "I like books. I like learning. I like sharing. If Albion's going to move forward, education is the way to do it. And if I haven't mentioned it already: _I like it_."

"Well, you like stupid things," he grouses.

"Fair point. I keep you around after all."

He actually sputters at that and Sparrow can't stop herself from giggling.

Reaver glowers and in an eye-blink, he's crossed the room. Sparrow isn't frightened by the quiet rage boiling in his too-blue eyes, but it does startle her. Enough so that she drops her pen. It's just as well because Reaver has grabbed her wrists and pinned them to the arms of her chair.

"I am not _kept_." Each word comes with the edge of a razor. "I am Reaver, not a puppy running at your heels. You would do well to remember that." She can feel the power of his Hero's blood. It sings under is skin, calling out to her.

Never one to back down from a challenge, Sparrow meets him. Her very skin hums as the blue markings and halo of light, normally dormant, burst forth. To his credit, Reaver does not back away though she _does_ note the subtle clench of his throat muscles, an imperceptible thing to untrained eyes.

"And _you_," she counters, "forget you're not the only Archon Child in this room. Release me before I make you."

The following second lasts an eternity. It is a grand standoff between titans, invisible yet so loud it can be tasted. There are only two ways that it can end. Because death would be inconvenient for the both of them, it's sex.

They struggle for dominance, both always coming up just too short to claim the match. The battle rages all over her study, across her floor and its desk, all the way to her bedroom. Her sheets are a warzone, tainted with Heroes' blood (amongst other things).

This time it's Reaver who leaves without a word or notice while Sparrow sleeps. The sensible bit of her says that it's good; that she should hope that this has driven him off. The less sensible bits lament his withdrawal. Queenly duties occupy her time well enough though, that Sparrow doesn't even realize that she missed him until he returns four years later.

**7.**

Plague steals into the countryside the year after Reaver disappears. An illness that makes its victims pale as their blood seeps into their bellies until they throw it up. Pale Fever, the common folk call it. It afflicts many of Sparrows people, Walter, Solomon, and Thomas amongst them, but takes few lives. Her consort is unfortunately one of the casualties.

Their marriage was not built on romance but Sparrow had depended on her husband for much. The life of a noble, even after three stablr years on the throne is still a foreign one to her. Leading is different from ruling and that is where she had valued her husband's advice most dearly.

Luckily, she still has Marcella to aid her. On top of being Thomas' mistress and Sparrow's friend, the other woman was also the late Prince Consort's right hand. She steps into Thomas' shoes gracefully, keeping the household affairs, ceremonies, and all of the like neatly in order despite her grief, or perhaps because of it. Sparrow returns her loyalty with the royal consort's crown which Marcella accepts.

It is a royal union both like and unlike her first. The marriage to Marcella dissatisfies most of the old blood aristocrats but after a duel in which mouthy Lord Silsbee loses an eye, things go quiet. Aside from that bump, it's easier, simpler. They both know what to expect with one another and the friendship they'd nurtured while Thomas lived deepens.

Only the question of children lingers at the back of Sparrow's mind. It's a question put aside easily, though; she's still not ready. Not today, but a soon tomorrow perhaps.

**8.**

Reaver, appropriately enough, returns during a storm.

Sparrow sleeps alone in her rooms; Marcella and she are intimate on occasion but they both prefer the comfort and familiarity of their own beds. If Thorne were still alive, she would have pegged him the second he slithered through the door. Thorne is gone, however, just like Rose, mother, and father, so the thunder has impeded Sparrow's sense of hearing.

She wakes when he's but a few feet from the bed. Her eyes open, spine a-tingle, to a black figure illuminated only from the dim embers of her hearth behind it. Instinct calls a Time Stop spell to her fingers. She throws this and rolls from the bed, putting it between her and her potential assassin. Her favored axe and rifle are in her personal armory, but a pistol and cutlass sit nearby for emergencies. Sparrow grabs both, aiming the former while producing fire so that her shot will be clear.

Reaver looks back at her, unimpressed.

Sparrow very nearly drops her pistol. "Reaver? What the hell do you think you're doing?!"

His usual wit doesn't come. Instead, he continues to stares at her, a strange intensity to his blue eyes. He's soaked, she notices, dripping puddles onto her floor.

Had he come to the palace on foot? In a bloody storm, even? _Why_ would he do that?

Before she can demand any more, he's crossed the distance between them. Sparrow very nearly shoots him; only a curious tremor racing up and down her spine stops her finger. She stays still, watching him shrug off his gloves and coat before his cold, damp hands take her face between them.

He looks at her hard, as if there is something on her face, some secret hiding in her skin. Then, just as Sparrow is considering stopping time and knocking him out, he kisses her. Reaver tastes of sea salt over the usual unique spice of him and even with half-frozen lips, he still burns her.

They race and stumble to disrobe him before they make it back to the bed. Flesh to flesh, it takes some time to warm Reaver up, but Sparrow is nothing if not persistent. Being gifted with Will and pyromancy help. He is strangely quiet during the night; still eager and receptive he says little and smothers most of the cries that she makes with kisses.

She never asks Reaver why he came back and he never offers an answer. He's there in the morning, though, and steadily for some years to come. Bowerstone and she are what he's chosen. For the time being anyway.

A far more important thing than Reaver's return comes from that stormy night however; the conception of her son.


	2. Revelations In The Light Of Day

**Disclaimer: **The Fable universe and all canon characters belong to Lionhead Studios and Microsoft.

* * *

**1.**

On the bright, May morning that her physician delivers the news that she is two months full with-child, Sparrow debates whether or not she will tell Reaver. He's going to find out eventually of course, he isn't a fool. A self-serving, lecherous, and amoral crack-shot, yes, but _not_ a fool.

Lying is on the table though. She probably ought to. Whatever connection they have, Reaver _isn't_ to be trusted. Sparrow owes the fragile life inside of her all of the protection that she can muster. That's a hard enough job without adding in a father who plays chess with the Shadow Court.

In the end, Sparrow settles this internal debate the way she always does; a coin toss. Heads she's honest, tails she cements Reaver in a sarcophagus and slips it into a Wraithmarsh bog hole.

"I'm pregnant." She aims those words at him like an arrow the second that he enters her study that evening.

In all the years that she has known him, Sparrow has yet to see Reaver taken aback. This news accomplishes such and if nothing else comes from this evening, she gets to relish that. He looks positively stupid when he's surprised too, all wide-eyed, and unbalanced. It's a face that disappears in breath, replaced with furrowed brows and a pursed mouth.

"Should I ask if you're sure?"

"If it will make you feel better go ahead." Her hand instinctively reaches for the brandy snifter sitting beside her desk, recoiling after she remembers. Seven months is looking exceptionally longer now.

Reaver, bastard that he is, takes it and makes a show of pouring himself some. She notes the tense way he holds the crystal, though. Like he's forgotten how to grip. He swallows down the whole—generous—glass and a second.

"Are you going to keep it?" he asks after a moment, tone of voice just a shade quieter than it normally carries.

Sparrow makes sure that her pistol and sword are within reach on her desk as she perches on its edge. She also calls forth the beginnings of a Time Stop to her fingertips. "I am. I'm ready to be a mother and Albion needs an heir."

He nods, eyes intent on the empty glass between his fingertips. Sparrow remains ready to fight.

"You don't expect me to play house and raise the thing with you, do you?" He finally raises his eyes to hers. The usual snide tone is back. Sparrow can work with that.

"Neither expected nor wanted," she assures him. "For starters I _am _already married and, no offense—well, all right, plenty of offense. But you're not exactly child-rearing material, Reaver."

That gets a chuckle. "No, I am not. I'm far better, I think, at the creating part."

"That I won't disagree with."

He's smirking now, a far more familiar glint in his eye as he sets down the brandy glass. Sauntering over to where she sits on her desk, Reaver places both palms flat on either side of her hips. Without shame, he looks down at her light silk shirt, examining her still flat belly and only slightly swollen breasts.

"Speaking of procreation, how long until we are no longer allowed to mimic it?" He tugs upon the already loose laces, revealing an inch more of cleavage.

"Books say that it isn't dangerous until towards the very end," she tells him, leaning non-too subtly forward.

"Ah, good news then." He tugs her off the desk's edge; Sparrow may even dare to say that he's being gentle. His arm slides over the small of her back, urging her toward the stairs to her bedroom. "Come, Majesty, let's make use of your limberness while you still have it."

**2.**

"This is going to sound absolutely stupid, but you were made to be pregnant," Marcella says one late afternoon as they go over the ever developing nursery.

Sparrow laughs, putting down the velveteen frog she'd been examining. "Well, it's certainly something I don't know I can agree with." She rubs her protruding belly; it feels longer than five months. Morning sickness has passed but she aches deep in her bones and finds herself weeping at strange moments.

"It's the way you look, goose," Marcella says, throwing a pillow at her. "All serene and aglow with life."

Sparrow raises an eyebrow. _She_ certainly doesn't feel serene, what she feels is bloated, miserable, and ugly. Uglier still in the same room as her consort; Marcella is an uncommonly beautiful woman. Long, silky strawberry hair, enormous green-blue eyes, and a figure that would—and has—made sculptors weep. Most think one so pretty must be fragile. Sparrow knows how untrue that really is; her wife has a mind sharper than any blade in the armory, part of why she married her.

"I think that you need glasses, Marcie," she counters tossing the pillow right back. "But I do thank you. Perhaps you can carry the next one and glow a bit yourself?"

Marcella doesn't miss a beat. "No thank you, Majesty, it's your bloodline. _You_ can carry it on just fine. Pun intended."

Sparrow laughs it off and continues puttering about; making lists for the cadre of nannies and decorators that her dear wife has already employed. After Marcella leaves however—it's so wonderful to have a friend and partner to dump all of the responsibility of court on—Sparrow finds herself inspecting her reflection in the freshly scrubbed windows.

Heroes, she's found both by living and by rare visits from Hammer, do not age quite so fast. Little about her face is different at sixty than it was at twenty-eight, when she defeated Lucien. Her black hair is untouched by any grayness but that's all that _she_ would deign to call attractive about herself. Pregnancy has bloated her and her brown eyes are ringed with the kind of bruises that accompany sleeplessness.

There's nothing new here. Or so, she decides, at first.

Under the setting sun, Lady Martin's ring glints. Sparrow has taken to wearing it on a long chain now that her fingers are swollen. It brushes the back of her hand which Sparrow occupies rubbing across the distended waist of her cream silk dress.

Serene and aglow, perhaps not. Content with this choice, this new path in life she's walking? Very much so.

**3.**

Deep snows cover Albion when Sparrow's son comes into the world. Birth was taxing, to say the least, but she expected that. And it's more than worth it when Doctor Alma places the screaming, slimy, pink, beautiful thing that is her first child in her arms.

The good doctor gives her a potion for sleep after Jasper and Marcella whisk the baby away to be cleaned. As exhausted as she is, Sparrow doesn't think it's necessary but still appreciates it. At dawn, she brought her son into the world; it's just before dawn again when she opens her eyes.

She's been bathed, her sheets changed, hair combed and braided. Water sits within hand's reach as does her son's gilded bassinette. The baby, however, is not in it; he's in Reaver's arms.

Looking down at the squishy bundle in blue silk, mild curiosity flits across his face. A nod is dipped in Sparrow's direction though he doesn't look at her. "The whole kingdom is drunk over this toothless little thing. I'm trying to see what's so special but I haven't quite caught on."

Sparrow chuckles; considering Reaver those words are downright _sweet_. "He's hope, silly." She shifts, not ready yet to sit up; her bed is _so_ very comfortable. "You're holding Albion's future. He'll be her king one day."

Reaver snorts. "Well, if _this_ is where things are going, I must say that I'm not all that impressed." She laughs again and while she does, Reaver holds the boy toward her. She accepts, leaning to the side so she can recline and look at him. Weak as a kitten Sparrow may not be, but tiredness still gnaws her bones.

Her son, who had been sleeping just as she had, stirs; little arms and legs wriggling. His tiny mouth pops open in a yawn and Sparrow can't tell whether her heart is breaking or growing.

After having months to get used to it, she still doesn't feel fully prepared to absorb all of this. That she's a mother; that this new, miniscule human being came from her and now depends on her for every single thing. That her heart and soul could be owned by someone she's really just met.

"Have you picked a name yet?" Reaver asks.

She shakes her head, intent on stroking the baby's cheek. It's the softest thing she's ever felt. "No. Well, I made a few lists but I haven't settled on anything." Honestly, she doesn't care about names; the important thing is the baby himself. Marcella can pick from a hat for all it matters to Sparrow. "Besides, I hear that it's bad luck to—"

"—to name a baby before it's been in the world three days." He finishes for her, smirking. She only gawks a moment; centuries between them though there may be, he comes from the country as well. Sparrow imagines that the old women of Oakvale murmured it just as often as their contemporaries in today's rural Albion still do.

Reaver cocks his head to the side, looking at the baby. Were it anyone else, Sparrow might say it was warm.

He stands after a few moments of this. He's leaving, she can tell by the line of his shoulders. A part of her wishes that he would not but the rest of her knows it's for the best. For all that she enjoys certain things about him, Reaver is not and never will be any sort of father to this child. Which is just as well, she plans on loving her boy more than he'll probably be able to stand. As will Marcella, Jasper, Walter, and nearly all of Albion.

He kisses her quickly, but not so quickly that it feels like a goodbye, before making his way to the door. Pausing with his fingertips on the curved brass handle, he looks back at her—at _them_, and once again, Sparrow is startled by how almost human he appears, if only for a second.

"If 'Logan' isn't already on the list I recommend it."

**4.**

Wanderlust is something that Sparrow never thought that she would shake. She took the throne and united Albion because it was the right thing to do, not because she particularly wanted it. At every opportunity over the last twenty years she's escaped the suffocating weight of the crown, running off to fight balverines, tend to the academy, any little thing, really.

Once she has Logan, there's almost no getting her to leave. She doesn't want to miss a single thing; not one cry, burble, or feeding. For so long she had no one and now she has, well, _everything_. And she refuses to give that up.

"You might just be the only queen in history who ever changed nappies," Marcella informs her one quiet morning as they sit in the nursery with Logan, posing for a portrait of the royal family. They've taken a break since Logan's gotten fussy and Sparrow changes him while the opportunity is present.

"I'm the only queen in history who's probably done a lot of things," she says while making ridiculous faces down at the baby. Logan hardly ever cries and even at half-a-year, there's a seriousness to his big brown eyes that Sparrow already knows will never leave him.

Still, he smiles when his mama makes faces at him.

"True enough," Marcella agrees. "You are going to have to give it rest this evening, though. You've been away from court too long. Tonight Princess Consort _and_ Queen of Albion will be presiding over dinner with the aristocracy."

The face that Sparrow is in the middle of making, turns on her wife. It's not intimidating at all, as demonstrated by Marcella's laugh. _Or_ effective at swaying her right hand.

Plucking Logan from her arms, Marcella sticks out her tongue. She's never wanted any children of her own but she truly does love Logan, no one would ever doubt that. "Tell your mummy, darling:" Her voice shifts to a ludicrous high-pitch and she bounces the baby along with each word as if he were a puppet. "_Mummy, you absolutely have to get back to running the country! Think about the legacy you're leaving me! For me, Mummy, for me!_"

"You're ridiculous!" she laughs. "But fine. You're right—_Logan_." They return to the portrait chairs and Sparrow swipes her son back. "I'll get back to enduring court. For you."

Marcella leans in to kiss her cheek then ducks down, as if to hide behind Logan. "_Thank you, Mummy!_"

She swats Marcella's arm, giggling. "Stop that!"

**5.**

Neither Reaver's visits nor their affair, have stopped in the sixteen months or so that Logan came along, but they do see significantly less of one another than they did before she gave birth. It's all just as well; Sparrow has a country to run and a son to raise while Reaver has…_Reaver things_ to do. Some of which are starting to intersect with her queenly duties.

Hence, her early afternoon time in the garden with Logan is interrupted.

She's been teaching him to walk on his own. He grasped the fundamentals of crawling and talking so quickly, he's still a bit wobbly when he stands by himself though. Not that he isn't being tenacious.

By the Light, she loves this little boy.

"Majesty, how radiant you are this morning! And his Royal Highness as well." She knows whose voice it is, of course, before she twists her head, a bit surprised to see him. It isn't that he's in the castle, but he prefers evenings for his visits and she doesn't think he's seen Logan since the boy was born. Whether that's respect for her wishes to raise him on alone (as alone as she can be with Marcella, Walter, Jasper, and an entire castle staff anyway) or detachment, that's Reaver's own affair.

"Thank you," she says scooping her son up and onto her hip. Gently, Sparrow nudges Logan to face Reaver. "Say 'thank you', darling." Even if present company might not often be worthy of it, she's teaching her boy respect. And, more importantly, never to cower; he's going to be a king one day, after all.

Logan's small jaw sets, as if he's intent on disobeying her, but a single raised eyebrow changes that inclination. A tiny "thank you" or something close to it comes out. Sparrow accepts it, for now. He'll have plenty of schooling on being clear when he's older.

Reaver bows as appropriate, his smirk never wavering. "You're most welcome."

"I take it you have something urgent that needs my attention?" Sparrow asks, adjusting Logan who has burrowed his face into her neck.

"Urgent might be a stretch but I would greatly appreciate a private audience," he says.

Sparrow nods, dislodging Logan delicately from her side. She settles him on the grassy patch that they'd been playing on. His blanket and a few toys are there including his favorite, Sir Bear, which he latches onto in her stead.

"Stay here." She cups his chin in one hand. "Don't wander off. You stay where I can see you, all right?" It's only a precaution; Logan is just about the best-behaved little boy she's ever known. And smart. He knows when his mother is being serious.

"Yes, Mummy," he murmurs.

Sparrow smiles and smooths his hair back as she presses a kiss his forehead. "Good boy. I'll be back very soon."

She turns and takes the arm that Reaver proffers her, glancing repeatedly back at her son as the other Hero leads her toward one of the nearby statues. Private but not so private that it looks overtly suspicious.

"What is it that you need?" she asks.

"Many things," he says, that telltale smirk lighting his eyes. "But I wouldn't overtax my dear queen. No, no, no. All that I need from you, Majesty, is a small consideration with a pet project of mine."

If it were a man other than Reaver, the way that Sparrow raises her eyebrow at him would send him running. It is Reaver, however, so nothing happens. "If this is an appeal for that little suggestion you made during the last court session, I am _still_ not allowing children in the factories. Or you to handle the orphanages."

"Crestfallen as I truly am about those rulings, living in the past isn't for me." With a flourish, he produces a paper from the inside of his jacket which he holds out toward her. Sparrow keeps her eyebrow up, but takes it.

It's a proposal for a series of high-end properties around Bower Lake. The land has, apparently, been acquisitioned by Reaver. It isn't one of his more devious looking plans at first glance, but since it's _him,_ Sparrow doesn't doubt at least a touch of darker intent lurking beneath.

"All right, so, what exactly is the appeal? Are you looking for an investment?"

"Only if you're offering, my Queen."

"No."

"Pity. Well, then, I shall continue with my original query."

"Which would be?" Impatience leaks into her voice. Queens don't get much personal time, especially Hero Queens, and time spent making sure Reaver isn't over-ravaging her kingdom is time taken away from Logan.

He rolls his eyes at her, almost fondly, as if the answer was obvious. "I'm informed by her Majesty's bureaucrats that I must wait for survey, inspection, and other such nonsense before I begin building which could take months. Since I've always been a loyal servant of the crown, I was hoping that you might flex your mighty influence to make an exception for me."

Sparrow laughs, unoffended as well as unconvinced. She knew he came here for some sort of self-service and honestly, she's surprised with the mundaneness of it. The last favor Reaver had tried to curry involved a flotilla of bordellos.

"You came to me to grease paper wheels for you?" she asks. "This could be solved with a bribe." It isn't as if she's advocating the practice, were it anyone else, Sparrow would throw them in the stockade to rot. But with Reaver, giving him leeway now and then on various disreputable points makes him toe the line far better than a clampdown ever would. Hence, he bribes rather than murders when there's a chance Sparrow would catch wind of it.

He sighs dramatically, playing with the cuff of his lambskin glove. "I may or may not have slept with the official in question's wife, daughters, sons, and mistress all in one go."

Another laugh. "Poor fellow."

"Indeed. I would have been happy to let him join in, had he come along earlier."

The witty reply blossoming on Sparrow's tongue dies away at the look on her companion's face. Reaver's eyebrows have drawn down at something over her shoulder. She turns at the same time he reaches out to make her turn, keeping his gloved hand on her waist after.

There's no need to point or speak, she sees what caught his eyes at once. Logan with the help of Sir Bear, is standing. All wobbly knees and inelegant teetering at first, he manages quite valiantly to rise and put one foot forward. His round arms wave, frantic like a bird's, as the other foot follows and again, and again, until they have a pace. It's about as coordinated a pace as drunkard's would be but that doesn't stop Sparrow's heart from damn near exploding when he closes the slight distance between them, catching himself on the hem of her skirt.

"Mummy, up!" he demands, tugging at the pale blue materiel.

Wonder thaws to exuberant pride and Sparrow immediately complies.

"Oh, look at you!" She scoops Logan into her arms, tossing him once in the air and then spinning around. "You wonderful thing you!" Her boy giggles and squirms as she presses kiss after kiss to any part of him she can reach.

Facing Reaver again, Sparrow reckons that she's grinning like fool. She might be crying as well, but she doesn't care one little bit.

"He did it," she says, as if Reaver had not been there the entire time as well. "He finally walked."

There's no overflow of satisfaction or any sort of emotion that comes from Reaver. He doesn't have the feelings that normal living humans do; Sparrow has known that since they met so long ago. He has a semblance, though, something that passes enough to say that he's trying; Sparrow has always been able to verify the sincerity of that semblance.

She sees it now as he tips his hat to Logan and offers a pleasant-enough, "Indeed. Well done, your Royal Highness."

It's the one milestone that they're both present for in Logan's life, and one of a surprising amount of things concerning Reaver that Sparrow never comes to regret.

**6.**

Royal balls are endlessly boring but Sparrow finds a little bit of tolerance for Masques. Mostly because they're far more relaxed than the usual courtly affairs. Tonight, is six-year-old Logan's first, which makes it particularly memorable. The Royal family comes as the Hours. Marcella is Dawn, all in soft pinks, yellow, and white, with rose gold and pearls woven into her hair. In contrast, Sparrow is Dusk, draped in purple blues with crystals in her black tresses to mimic the encroaching night sky. Logan, between them, is Day represented by bright blues, white, and luminous yellow-gold. He's a very good boy for the party, never pulling at his costume and politely dancing with the few noble girls around his age who've attended with their parents. Sparrow rewards his good behavior by sending him to bed early; which really means his nanny has instructions to give him a bath then let him read as late as he wants with as much cookies and milk as he wants. Just this once.

He kisses her cheek and Marcella's when she dismisses him, eyes alight with gratitude; he doesn't even forget to bow to the rest of the party as Genevieve (his nanny) takes his hand. Every mother thinks that she has the sweetest little boy in all the world. Sparrow is no exception.

The other children are sent from the party after Logan, their parents following her example. It leaves the adults to less inhibited revelry now that they don't have to set an example for anyone. A little more wine in everyone's cups gives Sparrow the opportunity to escape herself.

It's only for a bit, she tells herself as she makes her way into the quiet sanctuary of the garden, far from the din of laughing nobles. Like Logan, Sparrow has behaved well and has earned a small indulgence. Her son gets his books and cookies, _she_ gets solitude.

For a moment, at least. She hears Reaver's footsteps not long after she's made it to the farthest balcony, the one that overlooks the Old Quarter. As always, she knows that it's him even before the hum of his chuckle or the pressure of his hand on her waist.

Night is Reaver's costume; dark blue and black trimmed with silver. It suits him, though there is very little that doesn't suit Reaver.

"How naughty of you," he whispers as if they're conspirators. "Leaving your own party. Very unqueenly."

"They're drunk enough to let it go," she whispers back with a grin.

"Ah, but what if I told on you?" His satin-clad fingers tip-toe their way up her bare back. Sparrow leans into his touch, tilting her head just enough to bite the underside of Reaver's chin. A soft hiss comes, just for her.

"Tattling on the Queen is treason," she informs him. "And also a silly move when you committed your own party transgression by arriving so unfashionably late."

She's pressed between Reaver and the balcony now, thigh to thigh, both of his hands knead the swell of her hips while she drapes her arms about his neck. "I knew that Her Majesty would be occupied for most of the night dancing with a prince. What competition am I to that?"

"None," she answers honestly. Logan is more important to Sparrow than anything else in this world, including the man who helped to create him. Reaver knows that just as she knows that he isn't to be trusted. There's a great intimacy in such truth, one that Sparrow can never fully unravel. She doesn't need to unravel, though, she only needs to kiss back when Reaver's lips touch hers, and feel.

She never makes it back to the party. They have at each other once in the garden then slip off to the room just above that Sparrow always keeps spare for nights like these. Their costumes are ruined by the time that the next day breaks.

**7.**

"I am utterly disappointed in you, young man."

As much as Sparrow loves her son, she is not a mother who coddles. Marcella, Jasper, Genevieve, and even Walter cosset their "little prince". Sparrow is far more invested in raising him. That includes taking him to task when he behaves in a way that shames his position. Like punching Daniel Silsbee in the face.

He usually does so well at parties, a perfect little gentleman. In nine years, the most she's ever had to reprimand Logan over was how he neglected his swordplay practice. He prefers his books, chess set, and learning political politesse from Marcella to anything with actual combat. She's grateful of that, really, a smart boy is preferable to a hellion, but he's a prince and a prince who can't raise a sword will be a king that can't control a country.

But that is irrelevant at the moment. Logan's violent outburst at the Spring Garden Party is what concerns Sparrow now.

She sweeps forward, arms crossed. "Well, what do you have to say for yourself?"

He looks away, his already thin face pinched. Brown eyes, just like hers, just like Rose's, burn holes into his bedroom carpet. Nine-years-old and he stonewalls better than most adults do. She conveniently blames Reaver for that.

Just as Sparrow is about to storm out, she hears, "He called me a bastard."

That makes her start, to say the least. Just as the hurt simmering in her son's dark eyes does. Logan doesn't cry, not since he was a baby and even then, it was purely functional. Here he is now; lower lip trembling as the rest of his red face fiercely attempts to repress it.

"What?" Sparrow imagines she looks and sounds like an idiot when she says that. She can't say she isn't an idiot, though. This wasn't a conversation she ever even thought of even though logic dictates that she should have.

That hurt in Logan's eyes twists to rage and he pushes at her waist as the tears start spilling. "A bastard! He called me a bastard, Mother! He and all of those halfwits! They said that you and Mama were jumped-up commoner slattern and that I didn't have a father! They laughed at me! At _us_!"

She stares down at him for a few moments, lips frozen in a soft "O". Then, slowly, she kneels until they're at eye level, or at least fairly close to it. Even on her knees she's got a head above her young son.

"Logan…" Her throat sticks as she searches for the words she (irrationally) never considered before. Briefly, Sparrow clenches her eyes shut, cursing her own selfish part in all of this.

She lets him finish crying first, pulling him in tight against her chest until his breath is deep and even again. Then she dries his eyes with the silk sleeve of her gown.

"You are _not_ a bastard," she tells him. "Marcella and I are your parents and we are married."

"But—"

"Tell me the definition of a bastard."

He swallows hard but obeys. He's so much calmer now that he's wept. "A child born out of wedlock. _But two women can't make a baby_!" The last sentence is tacked on furiously. Fearfully.

"No, they cannot," she agrees. "But they can decide to make a baby with a man and raise it together. Or to adopt. That makes their children neither bastards nor orphans."

"But who did you make me with?" he persists, desperation clawing at every inch of his pale face. His small hands grip the arms of her dress so tightly that she feels the silk straining at its seams. "_Who_ is my father?"

Guilt gnaws her rib bones and sups upon her heart. _This_ is the crux of her boy's rage, this question she overlooked in some great naïveté of her plans.

Cupping his face in her hands, Sparrow kisses both of Logan's eyes. "Darling, the man who made you with me is _not_ your father. He's nothing to us and never will be."

It isn't all a lie. Not really. Well, to Sparrow Reaver is…something. She can't name it, exactly but they are connected. That connection has nothing to do with her son. To Logan, Reaver is a face at court, one that, by all appearances, only annoys his mother during open audiences, and that is all.

Sparrow takes another breath. "Listen; what matters, Logan, is that you're loved more than you would ever believe. Certainly more than those little monsters who dared to try and use the sorts of things which you can't control to hurt you."

He smiles at that, faintly. Sadness lingers in his eyes yet but it's paler, more acceptable. Sparrow still wishes to eradicate it completely. Even Heroes don't have that sort of power though.

She smooths his hair back and kisses his nose before she stands. "You're going to be a king one day, Logan. The Silsbee boy and his ilk are your people and you are to protect them just as you might beggars and Nanny Genevieve. That's part of the crown's weight."

He sighs, looking more like her than he ever has in his young life, poor darling "Yes, Mother." She laughs and kisses his nose one more time.

"Punishment is combat training with Walter for two-weeks. _At_ _dawn_."

Logan groans but doesn't protest.

"And I," she continues with a conspiratorial smirk, "am going to go join your other mother and together she and I will ask Lord Silsbee where his son might have gotten the presumption to treat the heir to the throne with such disrespect over tea. It will be a long tea, I think. Marcella has wanted to go over the rental fees to his estate for some time. Today is as good a day as any for that sort of business."

A grin brighter than the sun lights up the room and Logan throws his arms about her waist.

Coddling is not something that Sparrow does, no. Not a bit. Now defending her child with the fury of a swamp troll? That goes without saying.

**8.**

Reaver's "pet project" Millfields, once he actually settles down and starts on it, sis actually quite impressive. She can see much of the nobility vying for one of the sumptuous cottages that decorate the lakeside and he's no doubt going to stack the prices just for them. _If_ he can get the little bandit problem that's stopping the construction of everything under control of course.

Sparrow agrees to help him in return for two things. The first is that he stops proposing brothels every time that he comes to court. The second is that he has to go with her and put in half the work. If she's going to be away from Logan, then Reaver has to be away from whatever occupies him.

"Come on," she says as they leave the bandits camp. "Admit it; that was fun. You love killing things."

Reaver, who was standing far too close to a brute that she rent to pieces with a blast of lightning, glares and continues to fruitlessly rub human fluid from the handle of his precious Dragonstomper .48. His bad mood only brightens hers; funny how that works. She's practically skipping back toward the lake.

"You did it on purpose," he grouses like a child. "And why are you going back down there? Civilization is the _other_ way."

"Because I want to," Sparrow all but sings. It's a little cruel how she enjoys this; usually vexed but along for the ride describes _her_ in their whatever-you-might-call-it. She puts all of the blame on the midsummer heat. Everything is green, fresh, and alive and Bower Lake is beautiful. How can she possibly manage to feel anything but happy today?

Her intent, at the lakeside, is to splash a little water on her face, clean up her gear, then head back into town. As soon as she gets within twenty feet of that perfect, crystal blue reflection however, she has to swim.

"What on earth are you doing?" Reaver asks as she unlaces her shirt and tosses it down with her vest, gloves, axe, and rifle. Intrigue colors the irritated tone and she feels his eyes sliding down her backbone.

"Swimming," she says as she kicks off her boots. "Do not steal, hide my clothes, or allow anything otherwise unseemly happen to them. Seriously. I will invoke treason so fast that the Shadow Court will cry."

She continues to undress, discarding her breeches and small clothes in quick succession. Pulling the tie from her braid—it's going to get wet anyway—Sparrow makes her way to a rocky outcropping and dives in.

The water is much less inviting than it looks. It's cold. _Very_ cold. But luckily, she was very hot and is full of Hero blood, so she can stand it. Mostly. She still surfaces swearing like a dockworker.

Reaver cackles. "Oh, are the waters not as pleasant as they looked, Majesty?"

"Why don't you find out for yourself?" she counters, pushing herself up just enough for her breasts to rise clear above the surrounding water. Sparrow sticks her tongue out for good measure then dives back down, intent on exploring one of the tiny islands that pepper the lake. The scent of roses is coming from there and she does love roses.

They're wild roses, white on the inside with blood red edges. She can't quite remember but they might have grown on the family farm. Sparrow closes her eyes and falls back on a soft patch of grass beneath the flowers.

It never doesn't ache to remember her old life; she will always miss her sister. But it's easier now. Rose is irreplaceable, but having new people, Marcella, Walter, Jasper, and especially Logan, helps so much.

Rose would have loved Logan as much as she does, maybe even more.

Sparrow doesn't notice Reaver until his shadow falls across her, blocking her sunlight. She cracks an eye finding him fully clothed, soaked to the bone. The bits of people have been washed—mostly—from his nice tailored shirt though.

"You look like a drowned rat," she teases even as she reaches to pull him down. Surprisingly, he lets her and she rewards the acquiescence by straddling his lap and undoing that silly cravat he insists on wearing.

"And you—Ah!—" He jerks when her teeth skim his pulse point. "_You_ do not look like a queen right now."

Sparrow shrugs. "Well, I don't feel like a queen right now." She pulls his vest open, pushing it down his shoulders until the fabric catches at his elbows, locking his arms.

He raises an eyebrow, that rotten smirk that she's so used to finally reappearing. "Oh? And what do you feel like then?"

Sliding one hand up his neck, Sparrow grips the side of Reaver's face, fingers curling into the fine hairs at the nape of his neck. She pulls his head back, firmly not roughly, and lowers her face to his, so that their lips brush when she speaks.

"I feel like a woman who's going to fuck you senseless right here, right now."

Reaver doesn't say anything; he's too busy kissing her.

They've coupled more times than Sparrow could count of if she ever deigned to try. She knows his body and he knows hers, but something today feels different. Call it the heat, the scent of roses, the fight. Sparrow's blood is singing in her veins, calling to his and Reaver responds like a fever.

She forgets much in the long hours spent on that grassy islet. For a brief speck of time she's only Sparrow again, and the crown—along all of the crushing weight that comes with it—is far, far from her. Her senses are clogged by Reaver and that's…_good_. Surprisingly, wonderfully, intoxicatingly good.

The strange and ephemeral contentment that overtakes Sparrow this afternoon has a familiarity to it that she cannot place. She doesn't press herself to either. Later, she'll blame being numb with pleasure and call herself a fool. The intensity of that afternoon is identical to what she and Reaver shared the night that they created Logan. In the end, Sparrow isn't even surprised when she discovers that she's pregnant once more.


	3. Can't Choose What Stays

**Disclaimer: **The Fable universe and all canon characters belong to Lionhead Studios and Microsoft.

* * *

**1.**

Sparrow doesn't tell Reaver that she's pregnant again. Not because she doesn't want him to know but because by the time that she finds out, roughly a month after their little romp in Millfields, he's gone off on business. Whatever that business is or when he'll be back, are known only to Reaver himself. She could probably find some way to track him down and send a missive but really, the effort would be superfluous. Reaver is aware that he's the only man sharing her bed and with announcements made throughout the kingdom, this second child is hardly a secret. Eventually he'll hear about it and make an inquiry. Or keep to himself; one can never tell with him.

Carrying a child a second time seems to go on much easier than the first. It also feels as if it passes much more quickly to boot. Perhaps it's just that Sparrow knows most of what to expect this round and so things like morning sickness and the like don't bother her as much. Perhaps Dr. Alma is correct and second pregnancies are just plain easier.

Logan came into the world when it was white and the year was fresh. His sister makes her entrance just as the rains are beginning to melt the world into soft grass and bright flowers.

"She's _really_ small," Logan says. Curled beneath Sparrow's left arm while the right cradles his sister, he looks at the baby with a sweet mixture of curiosity, bewilderment, and feigned- superiority.

As his mother, Sparrow feels it her duty to ruin that. "You were small too. Smaller even."

He glares up at her. "I was _not_."

She laughs. "Oh you were. You were my itty-bity, little boy. Why, my hands cupped together were more than enough to hold you."

"_Mother_," he groans and Sparrow keeps laughing as if _she_ were the ten-year-old. Her son handles her teasing graciously enough, but then Logan handles most everything well. She can see the man he'll be down the road: all dry wit and sighs while pushing stubbornly on. He's her just with more reservation, which is probably for the best.

Her lips find themselves on Logan's forehead without warning, surprising both herself and the boy. He doesn't shy away though, just raises that one curious eyebrow.

"I love you," she says, hoping to the powers that be that she doesn't start crying. One thing about this pregnancy that didn't differ from the first was all the bouts of sporadic weeping. Sparrow smiles wide, just in case, and kisses Logan twice more. "_So_ much. You know that, don't you? You are my whole world, sweet boy."

As always, her son surprises her. Smiling softly back and brushing the satin swaddling cloth that his sister is cocooned in, Logan says, "We."

Sparrow's fairly certain that she _is_ indeed crying now. "Yes," she kisses his nose and pulls him closer. "You and Rose. My whole world."

**2.**

Garth comes with Hammer to see the new baby, and to deliver a gift. Apparently, he's figured out a way to get all of the Cullis Gates running properly as well as something special.

"Not that I don't appreciate you thinking of me," she says as he leads her about her new Sanctuary. "But what gave you this idea?"

Garth shrugs, like herself and Hammer, age hasn't touched him overmuch. He looks as he did in the Spire, if a bit less rigid and grumpy. His time in Samarkand has been good.

"If any of us who can use things like this would find it beneficial it would be you," he says. "A queen getting from place to place quickly is a great edge, I think."

"Very true." She leans across the magical map that's settled in the heart of the room. It shows all of the important areas of Albion, from her castle to Bloodstone. Looking at Bloodstone sends her eyes wandering up to Wraithmarsh and Reaver pops to the forefront of her thoughts, unbidden.

He's never been gone so long, not since before they conceived Logan. A month is the lengthiest stretch that's carried between them seeing one another. He has been gone for almost a year now and doesn't even know that he gave her a new baby. Apprehension is a foolish thing to feel on Reaver's behalf, he's undeserving of anyone's concern, even hers.

She remembers what the Shadow Court whispered that day, the day that she still hasn't forgiven him for, when she traded the youth of an innocent child to preserve her own strength so that she could stand against Lucien. For all of his tricks Reaver is on borrowed time. The sacrifices will stop one day, the Shadow Court had been sure of that, but whether it would be by choice or something else…

Sparrow shivers, tearing her eyes away from the map. Reaver is a big lad; she tells herself, rubbing her arms as if that could chase away the chill. His risks are his own and she has much more important things to worry over than him. Her children and kingdom, for example.

The behavior does not go unnoticed by Garth.

"Something wrong?" the elder Hero asks, gently laying a hand upon her arm.

"I'm fine, just a chill." Sparrow offers him a smile. He probably sees through it, Garth is the wisest man alive (that she knows, at least) so she doubts that he wouldn't take note of the nerves that her thin smile is struggling to conceal. He _is _generous enough however, not to press her about it.

"Of course," he says, not unkindly. "Would you like a rest? The childbed isn't that far behind you, my dear. Even Heroes have to be wary of what such things can do to their constitutions."

A true smile blossoms at Garth's concern and she bends just enough to kiss his cheek. "I _should_ see to Rosie's feeding and maybe a nap. Promise me afterward that you'll show me everything though. This is a wonderful gift, Garth, and I want to use it to its fullest potential for this kingdom."

"As you wish, my dear," Garth says. She can't remember her own father, but she imagines that he would look at her as Garth does now. An indulgent smile and pride in his eyes as he guides her back to the Cullis Gate.

**3.**

Raising a daughter is a wholly new experience for Sparrow and it has nothing to do with gender. Rosie is a screeching symphony to Logan's quiet solo. Laughter, tears, _everything_ that the girl does, she does with exuberance and hunger. Her bright eyes devour the world and everyone, from Sparrow to Marcella and even Jasper, have close calls with keeping the squirming girl in their arms. Sparrow could swear that she starts running before she walks, which is terrifying when coupled with the fact that Rosie could already climb like a little ape. Nothing in the castle is safe once those chubby little legs can carry her away properly.

It's a wonderful kind of chaos though. For all her wildness, Rosie is sweet. She climbs the pantry shelves for cookies to give to other children and unsuspecting staff. Logan has himself an adoring slave in his baby sister and poor Walter can almost never get her off of his knee.

Yes, Rosie is a different creature all together. Something that Sparrow has often thought about her father. She can't decide if its fate or just irony that those exact thoughts are running through her head when Reaver returns.

They're running about the garden, playing hide-and-seek while Logan has his afternoon lessons. Rosie isn't a very clever seeker or hider but she _is_ fast, if clumsy. But then again, she's only two-and-half.

"Foun' you!" her daughter giggles triumphantly, pouncing upon Sparrow.

"You did!" She catches Rosie and stands spinning her about as she peppers her little face with kisses. "Such a smart girl! Is it my turn then?"

Rosie nods, eager as a pup, so Sparrow sets her down, laughing as she does. "All right. You go and hide and I'll find you. I bet I can do it faster than you did!"

The only reply given is a gleeful squeal as Rosie rushes off, tripping and scrabbling like pickpocket on the run from a constable. Sparrow shakes her head and turns toward the outer terrace, palms pressed to her eyes as she counts. She goes slow, deliberately giving her daughter time—Rosie is very finicky about her hiding spots.

When she turns, Sparrow finds her section of the garden empty. Beyond the foremost surrounding forest of topiaries, fountains, and flowers, she hears giggling. Quiet as she can, Sparrow picks up the hem of her dress and tiptoes past a copse of very tall lilac bushes.

"Where oh where could my little girl be?" she calls as she follows the sound of Rosie's laughter. She creeps close along one of the ivy covered balustrades erected before the heart of the garden. The giggling is very near; she imagines that Rose is on the other side, mimicking the statue in the central fountain, that's one of her favorite "hiding" spots.

Sparrow is right about where Rosie is but not what she's doing. Their game has been forgotten; her daughter sits on the fountains edge, though one almost wouldn't be able to tell what with the hat clutched in her tiny hands. The overlarge and over-feathered hat all but hides Rosie beneath its gaudy span. Kneeling beside her and looking marginally amused is Reaver.

She stares at them for a few moments, dumbstruck. It isn't as if she thought he would never return but after two years without word and forcing him from her thoughts, seeing him in the flesh is a shock. Which is a silly thing in and of itself considering all of his previous (and much longer) absences.

"Mummy!" Rosie jerks her back to reality. Her daughter rushes her skirts, still clutching the hat.

"What do you have there?" Sparrow asks, looking at Reaver even as she scoops Rosie up. "Did you steal Lord Reaver's cap? Naughty girl." Rosie simply giggles and hides behind the ample, feathery brim.

Reaver stands as she approaches with Rosie balanced carefully on one hip. He looks just as young and handsome as he always has. Except in the eyes. Reaver has never quite been able to wish away the glint of age and experience that shines around his pupils.

"I hope that you didn't want that back." She nods down at the hat that Rosie is now trying to wear herself. "She's not one to concede a prize easily."

"Well, I am fond of such a fine _chapeau_," he says in feigned thoughtfulness. He thumbs the thin patch of hair on his chin that he's often dared to call a beard. "But seeing as I'm behind a few nameday gifts to her Royal Highness, I suppose I could part with it."

"How generous," Sparrow chuckles. She swipes an errant ebony curl from her daughter's forehead, a subtle call for her attention. "What do you say, darling?"

"Ank'ou," Rosie burbles somewhere beneath the mass of silk and feathers.

Reaver chuckles, bowing deeply to the little girl who can't see him. Not that it matters, his eyes are locked on Sparrow anyway. "You are most welcome, Princess."

"Welcome back," Sparrow says. She keeps her voice low; Rosie may not be old enough to understand what's being said, nor is she a particularly fluent mimic, but caution is always the best road in Sparrow's experience. And besides, one can never tell when an errant servant or noble might wander along. "You've missed a few things in your absence."

"So I see," he says, gaze shifting from her to Rosie. Her daughter is done hiding behind the hat and now stares at this strange gift-giver with no shortage of curiosity. Looking between them, Sparrow nearly starts as she realizes for the first time where the bright blue of Rosie's eyes comes from. She feels foolish, but then this _is_ her first time seeing them side-by-side.

A strange ache passes through Sparrow as she looks at her child and Reaver. She wants to ask him so many questions. What kept him away? How long has he been back in the capital? Did he hear about Rosie while still abroad? Is that why he's back? They're all normal questions, or they would be, were she a normal woman conversing with her lover and the father of her children.

But Sparrow is _not_ normal, and even less so is the man that she chose to produce said children with. There is a Line between them, one that divides who Reaver and she are and what they do. She has never resented that Line before, not until this moment as she realizes that Reaver's eyes are part of Rosie's face.

Smiling a half-smile for Reaver and adjusting Rosie's squirming weight, Sparrow swallows down the sudden lump crawling its way up her gullet. She turns before he can get a better look at her face.

"If you'll excuse us, the princess is due for a nap and there's a terrible amount of papers for me to look over before Court in the morning." She uses the same voice that she would for any courtier or servant that she'd wish to dismiss. Regality at its finest and something that she might actually have learned from Reaver himself. "Good day and again, welcome back to Albion, Lord Reaver."

She makes it about twenty feet.

"Sparrow."

She can count on one hand the number of times that he has ever said her name. Reaver isn't a fan of names, she's noticed over the years. It's one of those things that allows him to keep aloof and clean of the banality that comes with associating with other people. She's always been "Majesty" to him, or "my dear", "darling", or some other saccharine pet name before taking the crown. His voice is different too, quieter, not a plea—if Reaver is physically capable of pleading she will eat her boots—but certainly not a command. How can she possibly deny such a request?

That flash of humanity, of the man he must once have been, is visible for a scant second as she pauses and looks back at him. A struggle is taking place under his skin, she knows despite the careful blankness that his features quickly school to. It shows in his eyes, he can't hide much in his eyes, not from her.

He clears his throat and tilts his chin. "I understand that Her Majesty has a busy schedule, but might a…private audience be possible in the near future? Say, the evening after tomorrow?"

Sparrow knows what he really means by "private audience" even if the usual lascivious eyebrow waggle and tone don't accompany the words. She also knows what answer she _should_ give. With Reaver though, Sparrow hasn't been doing what she should for so long that nodding now is as easy as breathing in. After adjusting her fidgety two-year-old yet again, she does just that and then continues on. She hadn't been kidding about the paperwork and Rosie's nap.

**4.**

The year that Logan turns fourteen, it's decided that the time for his first real courtly responsibility has come. Considering his age and all that he still has yet to learn, Marcella proposes that he act as the Royal Emissary at Brightwall. Sparrow can't say that it isn't a good idea; it combines furthering his education—at the seat of all of Albion's knowledge no less—and duty appropriate to his age as well as his station. She does not, however, enjoy the idea of her child being so far away for months on end.

Her son is a smart boy, good, strong, and calm; he's ready to serve his people and itching to do so besides. Sparrow makes her peace with it, for his sake. Besides, her personal Cullis gate means that she can pop into Brightwall on a whim.

"I'll make you proud, Mother," he says after he's kissed and hugged Marcella. Standing before her, Sparrow finds that their respective gazes are perfectly level. She's not unusually tall, but Logan is on his way to being such. He's not a man yet, but neither is he a boy.

No. His age doesn't matter; Logan will be Sparrow's little boy until she's long gone and ice cold.

She takes his face between her hands. "You make me proud by breathing, darling. Go do this for yourself." She kisses his forehead before taking his hands. Logan pretends that his eyes aren't moist as he bows deep enough that the top of his head brushes her wrist. In turn, Sparrow pretends not to notice.

Coming back up, he clears his throat and eyes the empty space to her left, where Rosie should be. If Sparrow is less than thrilled with the idea of Logan leaving home, then her daughter is absolutely inconsolable over it. Rosie spent the better part of the month leading up to this day trying to hide in her brother's luggage. As far as her little girl is concerned, Logan hung the moon and put up the stars and is convinced that they will all sputter out once he's left. Sparrow wasn't surprised at all when Rosie claimed she had a bellyache and refused to leave bed that morning.

"She'll understand, Logan," Sparrow assures her son. She finger-combs his ever-untidy hair. "Eventually, I promise."

"I went to her room last night," Logan says, gaze locked beyond her on the windows. "She said that she hoped that I never came back."

Sparrow winces inwardly, but for her son she smiles. "You know she doesn't mean that. Little ones just don't like change. Mark my words, darling, the second that she realizes that you've gone away she'll regret it."

"I hope you're right," he murmurs, sad eyes moving back to her face.

"I'm your mother, sweetheart," she tells him with a laugh. "I'm _always_ right. Even when I'm wrong."

A tiny smile lights up his too-serious face. "That's rather convenient, isn't it?"

"Don't worry, dear," Marcella says, all mischief sparkling in her blue-green eyes. "Once you're king you'll get to say silly things like that too."

Sparrow feigns a noise of outrage. "_Treason_! Off with your head, wench!"

"Whatever Her Majesty says," her wife laughs. She primly brushes a strawberry and silver curl out of her eyes. "I do hope that she'll enjoy finishing the preparations for this year's Fall Ball that I've only just started. _And_ seeing to the account ledgers—"

An overly put-upon sigh passes Sparrow's lips. "Fine, fine. I shall reconsider your heresy, just this once, my lady."

A flourishing curtsy and a smirk come with Marcella's reply. "Whatever my beloved wishes. She is _always_ right, after all."

Logan laughs, real, genuine laughter that echoes deep in his chest as he shakes his head at his parents. Sparrow thinks that he sounds like Reaver, just a bit. She pulls her son into a hug before that thought can be explored.

"I love you," she whispers, forgetting all regal propriety as she clutches Logan to her. "More than anything you ever could imagine. You know that, don't you?"

Like her, her son has forgotten the aloof way in which royalty is supposed to behave in public. He buries his face into her shoulder just as he would have when she carried him on her hip. Warm dampness leaks into the soft indigo satin where he's pressed his cheek and Sparrow strokes the back of his neck. She kisses him twice, once on each temple, before releasing him.

"Go," she says. "Stay any longer and I might not be able to bear for you to leave."

He nods and with one last kiss to Marcella's cheek turns toward his entourage of guardsmen, already saddled and ready to go. His shoulders, once so thin, square-up and his backbone straightens. If he only had hip cocked and his pistol in hand, she might mistake him for Reaver from behind.

That's not a bad thing, she decides as she watches her son walk to his horse and mount up. So long as he never gains any of Reaver's arrogance, a little more of his confidence won't do Logan any harm.

Across the courtyard, Walter nods to her before riding to the front of the company and ordering a march. The journey to Brightwall won't be quick; Marcella has arranged a small Progress for the crown prince. He'll stop along certain points to see his kingdom and let the common folk know their heir; trade centers, ports, and even the bread basket of Oakfield will host him. Through every step, it will be Walter looking after Logan. There are precious few people whom Sparrow trusts and even fewer that she would trust with what's most precious to her. If she can't watch over her boy personally then Walter is the finest proxy that she can think of.

She watches them ride off, Walter first, then a section of guards, Logan in the middle, and another guard section at the rear. That confusing, so-full-that-it-must-be-breaking swell has its grip on her heart again. A literal ride into manhood, that's what she's witnessing, and there will be no turning back.

"Logan!"

Sparrow jumps and almost hits Marcella as she spins about to see Rosie sprinting through the doors, Genevieve and Jasper scrambling behind her. She's barefoot and still in her pajamas, though she certainly doesn't seem to care about either. All that Rosie can see is her brother riding away.

"Logan!" Rosie screams again as she flies down the stairs, just out of Sparrow's grasp. Her daughter is swiftness incarnate; more often than not, an unfortunate thing for the rest of the household.

The order for her to stop rises in Sparrow's throat and then stems itself as Logan reins his horse to a stop. Surprise flits across his face, even at this distance Sparrow can see his brown eyes widen. That surprise doesn't last. For a moment, she's sure that he'll ride on through the castle gates, but in less than a second he's urged his mare full-circle and gallops back. In one smooth motion, he stops the horse and slips from the saddle, colliding with his sister who's leaping at his chest the second that his feet are on the ground.

As Rosie sobs apologies and Logan soothes her, Sparrow cannot hold back a very satisfied smile. Beside her Marcella sighs the heaviest of sighs and rolls her eyes when Sparrow tilts her head in her direction.

"Avo's saggy arse, there will be _no_ living with you now," her consort says. It's a good-natured complaint, one that comes with a smirk and plenty of warmth.

"Was there before?"

"Hmm. Fair point."

**5.**

"Must you do that in bed?" Reaver asks, lips brushing Sparrow's stomach.

She starts and nearly drops letters. She _thought_ that he was asleep; actually, she's still very sure that for a while there he was. Even Reaver, as inscrutable and rascally as he may be, would have no other reason to snore into her navel.

"I'm sorry is my _reading_ too loud?" She cocks an eyebrow over the letters in her hand. The tone is sharper than what she means to use. It isn't his fault that she has so much to do.

They are in Bloodstone, a first in ages for the both of them. It's become a respectable port city since he (mostly) abandoned it. Reaver is here because of some vague business and playing as "host" for her. Sparrow is there, along with a good bit of the army, to set up outposts and start chipping away at the Wraithmarsh. Oakvale is a lost cause, but she's determined to get as much of the surrounding swamps back as she can. So far, it's been a good campaign. Swift, Turner, and Walter have a bet going on over who can collect the most Balverine pelts. Last she checked, Turner was in the lead; he's shot enough of the blighted things to carpet the entire castle.

Thoughts of Balverine rugs are erased as Reaver yawns and slides out of bed. "Excruciatingly," he tells her. Another yawn comes when he turns and makes his way across the room and to the ample wine service that he keeps between his vanity and closets.

He's naked, of course. Reaver has an aversion to clothes while there is a bed in the same room that he currently occupies. Not that she's complaining. No. Not at all. Naked Reaver might just be her favorite version of him. Especially when he bends over.

"Why aren't you asleep?" he asks, returning to the bed with two full chalices. She accepts hers but doesn't get to drink as he covers her hand on the stem. Smirking, he leans in just enough to brush his lips against the shell of her ear. "Did I not tire you properly, Majesty?"

She chuckles and nips his jawline. "To the bone, rest assured."

Reaver draws back. Those perfect white teeth of his have sunk into the left side of his lower lip. She knows that look well; he's tempted to find out just how tired she is. Surprisingly, he does not initiate; both a disappointment and a relief.

"I just have to finish reading these," she says fluttering the stack of papers in her lap. She doesn't _have_ to, not really. They're only minor reports and requisitions and Turner with his quartermasters is more than capable of seeing to everything. In fact, he (along with Walter and Swift) have dropped more than enough hints that she should stop interfering. Delegation has never come easy to Sparrow however, even after so many years on the throne. Hence, her stubborn pride is eating into her bedtime even though she knows better.

Reaver, meanwhile has released her hand and settled on the bed's edge. A none-too-subtle nudge of his hip against hers urges her farther toward the middle. Sparrow complies, she rolls her eyes and sighs because, _really_, would it be so very hard to cross back to his side of his gigantic bed? But she still complies and is rewarded by Reaver snatching her forms away.

"Hey!" Red wine nearly coats the crimson sheets in her scrabble to steal the papers back. Reaver foils both, nimbly catching her cup in the same hand that took her book and then springing out of reach. He grins as no one should ever have a right to. "Dammit, Reaver, give those back—and don't ruin the order!"

Unsurprisingly, he doesn't listen. Well, he half doesn't listen. The papers aren't returned as demanded, he puts them atop the closet that she's taken over while staying with him, but he doesn't go out of his way muss them either.

Back to the bed Reaver saunters and sits again, on _her_ side, of course, ignoring her glare and proffering back the wine. She takes it only because now that she's angry, she needs a drink.

"I was nearly done," she tells him after draining her chalice.

He doesn't bat an eyelash at her glare. She didn't expect him to but still. "You're a queen; you have a very willing staff to take care of such trivial things for you."

She narrows her eyes at him as she sets the empty chalice on the bedside table. "Have you…Have you been talking to Walter?" This admonition is an almost exact reprise of the one that Walter gave her yesterday. Reaver flavors them with more condescension, but it's still damn close. Which is surprising seeing as the two of them can't seem to stand occupying the same room, let alone exchanging a conversation.

Reaver only shrugs. "He isn't wrong. Besides, your time could be much better spent." The words are calm, bordering upon coy. "Look at you." He cups her chin and swipes his thumb across the apple of her cheek. "Dark circles look ghastly on you, _ma belle_."

She smacks his hand away. "Well, don't look at me then."

Reaver snorts into his glass, still unaffected. "Dearest, I'm not a man of many scruples but even _I_ think it would be in poor taste to fuck the queen with a sack over her head."

Down drops Sparrow's jaw and up rises indignation in her chest but Reaver covers her mouth with his own before she can be properly outraged. She kisses back out of instinct. The taste of Reaver's tongue is something ingrained in her senses; she welcomes it from memory before consciousness catches up. Just as it occurs to her to push him away, his lips move, across her jaw, down her neck, and Sparrow's resentment falters. Resistance flows thin in her veins; she all but _lets_ him push her back against the sheets and slide between her legs.

Her head is a cottony mix of exhaustion, arousal, and something carefree that probably came from the wine when Reaver finally pauses and looks down at her. She shouldn't have swilled it down like that; the man has a constitution that would make legion of vintners sick. Only the most potent spirits stock his shelves. It was probably laced with something too, because Reaver considers revelry a profession and not a pastime.

Tiredness and good sense war with want and her ever-shrinking inclination to care. Before any sort of protest or encouragement can be decided upon, Reaver's frame sinks against Sparrow's. He covers her, angling his upper body to the side just enough so that he can still look at her.

"Go to sleep." His words come almost gently, more of a suggestion than a command. They puff across her cheek, both acrid and sweet from the wine. "You're of no use to anyone, shambling about like a Hollow Man."

"Haven't been shambling." It's a token protest, slurred against his shoulder. Her traitor eyes are fluttering shut already and no threats can force them open. For a cold-blood bastard, Reaver produces heat like an oven and the extra warmth does not assist in her struggle to stay awake.

In the morning she will—_grudgingly_—hand report responsibilities over to Turner along with the promise to stop micromanaging. Tonight she sleeps deeply and without dreams, clinging to Reaver.

**6.**

Fear is not an unfamiliar thing to Sparrow. Time and time again, it has gripped her in its icy claws. Never before though, has it possessed her to the point of that she can hardly breathe or think, nor has it ever partnered so closely with rage. And Sparrow never, ever in her wildest dreams could have expected that it would be one of her children that would cause such a helpless feeling to crash through her.

From the second that the note was found in Rosie's nursery, Sparrow has been numb. While Marcella, Jasper, and even Walter panicked, _she_ found her weapons and picked the trail. Through waves of Hobbes, she had remained focused and calm, not even the sight of her daughter crying in that cage had rattled her. She manages to hold everything together until she's led Rosie out into the sunshine.

"I'm sorry I ran away, Mummy." Rosie's voice is tiny. She knows that something is still wrong despite the danger being behind them; she's a brash girl, not a stupid one.

Something inside of Sparrow, deep in her chest, rattles and very nearly puts her on her knees. She holds though, and instead asks, "What on earth were you thinking?" Her voice sounds so unlike her, so cold and distant that Sparrow almost doubts that she's even speaking.

Rosie's head hangs lower as she fists her muddied and torn skirt. "I—I just…I only wanted to be like you. A Hero."

That thing in Sparrow's pops. It's not her heart, but the proximity is close. This feels deeper, an explosion in the very center of her that sends red-hot, raw, emotion swarming through her veins.

Letting go of Rosie's hand Sparrow drops to one knee and grabs her daughter roughly by the shoulders. "Don't say that!" She's trembling so badly that she almost doesn't realize that she's shaking Rosie as well. Her voice feels even less like it could belong to her now, saturated with rage and fear. "Don't you ever—_ever_—say that again! Do you hear me? _Do you hear me?!_"

Terror and pain line Rosie's face as Sparrow holds her there. She feels her fingers making bruises on those little arms and all of her fury crumbles at the reflection she finds in her daughter's eyes. She looks like a monster painted with a halo and Will lines.

Sparrow has never cried in front of either of her children before. Tears of joy have eked out once or twice but she has never lost herself to waves of unhappy sobbing. She is their mother, their queen, and their Hero in every definition; she doesn't want them to doubt her strength or her protection.

At this moment however, Sparrow has no strength to hold up her mask. Pulling Rosie's little body against her chest, she splinters, and all that stops her from flying apart is the fragile weight of her daughter in her arms.

Being a Hero is a burden; that is a fact that Sparrow has never admitted to herself, not until this very moment. Her blood and power have cost her as much as they have given her. Her sister, Thorne, her freedom, and those are only a few of the casualties. Her lineage has seen her hunted, sacrificed, and consumed by vengeance until she'd almost forgotten what it was like to live as a person. Being a Hero is a blessing for Albion but a curse for Sparrow and the resentment she's denied so long feels as if it will choke her now.

In her arms, her daughter is still and quiet save for the occasional sniffle. Little fingers dig into the straps of her coat and Rosie's face is warm and wet against her collarbone. Sparrow only adds to the wetness, leaking her own tears into Rosie's black curls.

"You don't want to be me, sweetheart," she whispers. "Believe me, being a Hero is not what you think it is."

Rosie is too young to grasp what's being said. All that she can really understand is that her mother is upset. Still, Sparrow hopes against hope that her daughter will never forget this day, hopes that it will haunt her dreams forever and a day. Wisdom will come in time, and perhaps down the road, she'll be able to hear them more clearly. It's the only protection that Sparrow can really offer when it comes to such things.

For now though, Sparrow gathers her little girl up and blinks away to the Sanctuary, to her map, and then home.

**7.**

"What's this?" Sparrow asks as her nightcap with Reaver is interrupted by two burly men wheeling a large crate into his study. She raises an eyebrow at her companion and he, in turn raises his glass of wine.

This year's Summer Solstice Fête is to take place on Bower Lake, and so Reaver of course, has volunteered his services to host not only the event but also the Royal Family. Hosting the fête is his way of endearing the nobility to him for when he wishes to ply one of the many favors always hiding beneath his silver tongue. Lodging she, Marcella, and her children is his way of ensuring a discreet path to his bed is always open during the festivities. It's open to Marcella as well, but Sparrow's wife is currently bedding a set of twins and she has a rule about too many heads under her sheets.

"Just a little something I forgot that I had acquired, Majesty," he says, dismissing the men with a wave.

"Well, that's not ominous at all." The left corner of his mouth twitches but Reaver gives nothing away. Suspicious but not the alarming sort of suspicious. Sparrow acquiesces.

Beneath the nailed lid and several bales worth of straw, she discovers quite the prize. It's an axe. Thinner and longer than her preferred Master Axe, an intricate pattern has been chiseled through the flat of the head. Pretty _and_ practical—the holes will make for a faster swing. The butt is capped by a wicked looking spike and she finds five augment slots carved just above it.

Up again goes Sparrow's eyebrow as she looks at Reaver from over the crate. "What's this?"

He snorts. "My goodness and we let you run the country. It's an _axe_, Majesty. You've used one to chop down an enemy one or twenty-thousand times."

Sparrow resists the urge to smack him with the flat of the head. "I know what an axe is. The question—which you _knew_—was why are you showing it to me?"

"I thought that since you're so predisposed to hacking at things like a barbarian, you might be looking to add to your collection," he says. Pouring himself another goblet of wine, Reaver nods to the weapon. "Test it if you like."

She glances around the room even as she lifts the axe, checking the weight. Reaver's study isn't small, but it isn't so big that Sparrow feels easy about swinging a polearm about it.

As if he anticipated this—which, of course he anticipated it, he wouldn't be Reaver otherwise—Reaver goes over to one of the wall sconces and gives it a twist. The bookshelf directly to its left swings forward. He bows deeply and doesn't spill a drop of from his glass.

"What is with you and hidden passages?" she asks even as she walks past him.

The room beyond Reaver's study is…odd. Well lit and spacious, it has five walls, all of which have at least one very large mirror upon them. The floor is exceptionally polished as well; Sparrow can see herself almost as clearly by looking down as she can by turning to one of the mirrors. Other than a wine service tucked neatly into one of the corners, it is bare of furnishings.

"I don't think I want to know…" she says as she looks up and finds yet another mirror fixed upon the ceiling.

Passing her on the way to the wine service, Reaver brushes a wayward strand of hair behind her ear. His fingers dawdle on the juncture of her jaw and she has to fight off a shiver. He smirks. "Nothing so awful as you're thinking, my Queen, I promise." Then on he goes to pour himself even more wine.

Sparrow eyes him for a moment but says nothing. Instead, she hefts the axe upright, testing the weight, then gives a swing.

She's right about the speed and is almost unprepared for the lightness and ease with which it swings. The silvery edges positively glimmer as Sparrow goes through the motions of a practice pattern. Her skin prickles with each arc, chop, and block; not at all an unpleasant sensation.

By the end of the pattern, Sparrow is more than a little thankful that she chose not to change out of her riding clothes before joining Reaver that evening. Sweat trickles from her hairline into her collar, dampening every crease in her clothes; the space between her breasts feels particularly moist. Her breath comes heavy and quick while her muscles burn.

She forgets what it feels like sometimes, the rush of trying a new weapon. Adventures are, for the most part, relegated to her past. She's a queen now and more importantly, she's a mother. Sparrow has no regrets in setting aside her wanderlust to raise her children; Logan and Rosie are her reason for living. Even with all that in mind however, she can't deny that there are moments when she wants to cast off the shackles of the crown and just _fight_. It's what Heroes were made for, after all.

Wiping her brow with one arm, Sparrow shows off just a little more, spinning the axe with the other as she faces Reaver again. His smirk has only deepened as he looks at her over his chalice. She sees the spark in his eyes, the glint of recognition.

It should be a disquieting that the only person capable of seeing this feeling inside of her, of seeing this craving for challenge pounding in her veins, is the person she must trust the least. Not only does he see it, Reaver _shares_ it.

It's an intimacy that she has with no one else, none of the men who serve her and not Marcella. Hammer and Garth might be exceptions but seeing how far removed they always are, Sparrow doubts that she'll ever find out. Reaver and Reaver alone has touched this part of her and he has been surprisingly careful with it over the years.

If she stopped to think about it, Sparrow might be able to pick out many instances of Reaver being careful with her. There is no time for that now however, not when he's crossed the room and pressed her to a bare spot against the wall. They kiss fiercely; Sparrow tastes the thrum of battles yet fought in the scrap of lips and teeth. He steals her already ragged breath and gives her his in return while demanding more. Glancing briefly past him, to their numerous reflections, Sparrow thinks that they look almost complete, wound up in each other as they are.

He's got her right leg up over his hip and she's pulled his shirt open when the grandfather clock back in the study chimes nine bells.

"Dammit," she growls into Reaver's hair. "Dammit. Dammit. _Dammit_."

Reaver doesn't seem to notice that she's stopped trying to get his trousers open. Understandable, considering he is very intent on mapping the column of her throat with his lips and tongue. She hates to interrupt him, especially as his teeth move up to her earlobe. Sparrow curses again (silently) and curls her fingers into his hair. When she tugs, he raises his face to hers with blown pupils and a snarl.

"Stop," Sparrow orders as he kisses her mouth again. Her hands press his chest, not that there's any need. Reaver doesn't like it—she gathers from the irritation wrinkling his normally smooth brow—but he stills.

"What's wrong?" His voice is a breathless rasp; Sparrow adores the sound.

"It's Rosie's bedtime," she says. Her own breath hasn't quite returned either. "I—I need to go tuck her in."

He stares at her for a moment, disbelief painted on every inch of his face. Finally, though, Reaver growls, unclutching her leg as he does. He stays close still, dropping his forehead to her collarbone.

"You _must_ be joking." He grouses like a child denied sweets. Like Rosie does, in fact. "That's what nannies are for!"

Sparrow chuckles with sympathy even as she corrects him. "No, that's what _mothers_ are for." Carding the finer hairs at the nape of his neck, she brushes her lips against the heart tattoo on his cheek.

It's not that she doesn't want to keep going. She's on fire and Reaver is hard against her hip; there are very few things that Sparrow would not give to continue tearing his clothes off. Promises made to her daughter are not among the tradable items.

Still, she does her best to be kind to her (temporarily) jilted lover. "She sleeps better when I read to her. Deeper sleep means that she won't wake with the urge to crawl into anyone else's bed." The bed in question will most definitely be Logan's should it happen; Mummy kills monsters and saves the world but Big Brother is the nightmare chaser. All details that Reaver doesn't need.

Sparrow kisses him once more before giving his shoulders a firm push. "Come on. I won't be long." Reaver assents and releases her, taking a step back. It requires a great chunk of her willpower not to latch onto him again. Reaver without a shirt, or close to it, makes her a little senseless. Grasping for that last bit of sensibility, she focuses on straightening herself.

Reaver makes noncommittal noise at the back of his throat but helps to put her hair back in order. His fingers are careful and the pins that he replaces never scratch her.

**8.**

Sparrow trusts Logan, probably far more than any other mother of a sixteen-year-old boy might. She also believes that there is nothing he cannot accomplish if he puts his mind to it. Regardless of both of those facts however, the last thing that she would ever allow would be for him to fight a Troll. Given that the blasted thing pops up between Bloodstone and Fort Bracken, on a road her scouts had guaranteed was clear, she has very little say in the matter.

She's taking her heir on a tour of military outposts before he returns to school in the rapidly approaching autumn. Things had run very smoothly up until they were in the recovered areas of Wraithmarsh. Honestly, that's her fault and she knows it. Not expecting something to go pear-shaped around the most preternaturally contaminated area of Albion is downright moronic.

The second that the Troll rises from the roadside bog, Sparrow leaps from the saddle and tears Logan from his. Horses don't do well around scary things, in her experience. The six guardsmen in their company follow her example. As predicted, the horses panic and flee off the road, no doubt into the bellies of balverines. Sparrow can't muster much pity for the mounts though; she's far more preoccupied with the monster too close to her son.

"Go! Go! Go!" She all but flings Logan toward a ruined stone half-wall. "Stay down until it's gone!"

"But—" He falters with a hand upon his sword.

"Dammit, boy, don't argue with me!" She shoves him harder this time and he nearly falls. That can be a regret for later; at the moment there are very, very large rocks being thrown about and she wants him far away.

She shouts her orders as she runs, axe at the ready. "Pick a vantage and wait for the tendrils to come out, I'll distract it!"

The men follow her word, Sparrow doesn't have to look to know; they aren't fools. Whether or not she is though, now _that_ is up for debate. People who aren'tfools probably don't go baiting trolls. People who aren't fools probably don't even meet trolls. At all. For now, she does her best not to think about that, there's a monster that needs her attention.

Sparrow dodges debris and hacks at as she leaps about, doing her best to force the beast's back to her guards. It works to a certain degree. She needs to look more closely into the training that these boys get with their firearms because they have the accuracy of a bunch of blind beggars.

Then one of them manages to actually strike their damn target and it all goes tits up.

By nature, Trolls aren't terribly bright. Flailing angrily and brute force are their strong points, not thinking. However, _this_ particular brute is bright enough to notice when he's being baited. A deafening roar goes up as the Troll lumbers about and before Sparrow can so much as open her mouth, a rain of boulders is coming down on her men.

Four of the six see it coming and roll out of the way. The other two, well, they appear to die quickly if nothing else. She'll mourn them later.

With a roar of her own Sparrow leaps onto the rolling hill that makes up the monster's back, using the spiked end of her axe as leverage. In retrospect, not her smartest idea, but she's just watched two men not much older than her son die. This thing has to be put down _now_.

It goes well, for a moment. There's no time to concentrate for a really powerful spell, but she can toss electricity and blades as she goes. She gets two nerve-tendrils before the Troll throws her.

Sparrow isn't prepared for the fall; the beast is quicker than she could have anticipated. One moment she's driving her axe into its shoulder and the next a stony fist has rammed into her side. She flies, more like a cannonball than a bird; trees crack beneath the force of her and for a moment all is black.

When her dizzy head returns to her aching body, Sparrow finds herself a hundred or so yards back, waist deep in muck and mire. Her side throbs, that's a cracked rib, perhaps a rupture. She'll survive of course, but a healing potion wouldn't be amiss. More importantly, she needs to get up because the Troll is still out there and so is Logan.

There are no words for the terror that floods Sparrow to see her son standing vulnerable in front of that monster. He's so small and thin in the Troll's shadow, he'll splinter apart like a sapling if it so much growls.

She tries to scream for him to go back to hiding but she just doesn't have the air. Sparrow doesn't have much at all; her head is pounding and her side is on fire, but fear turns off the parts of her perception attuned to those things. Up she lurches onto unsteady legs. Her axe is out of reach, still buried in the Troll's shoulder, and she still has her rifle, though with the stars still dancing in the corners of her eyes Sparrow is not so sure about her aim. But she always has one failsafe tucked into her sleeve.

Unnoticed by the Troll, she pulls from the reserves of her Will and the spell that's served her better than any other. She slows time. And as she slows time, Logan's pistol strikes a nerve tendril.

Her boy looks back toward her; he's felt the pull of her Will before, he knows what she's doing. Sparrow thinks that she might see him smile before he rolls out of the range of debris and fires again.

His quickness is unbelievable. She's seen Logan spar, the coin and time she spent on proficient instructors has never been questioned. But a fight is _not_ a sparring session. Fights are bloody, rough, and unpredictable. He is undoubtedly fighting now and by Avo, he _holds_.

Sparrow continues to manipulate time and force herself forward as her son, with help from their surviving guards, leads the offense. Leaping, rolling, dodging, she'd be enthralled with the sight were the situation not so dire. He moves so bloody fast, like cat, like…

Logan hits the very last nerve tendril as Sparrow finally gets herself back to the battleground. The Troll rolls and collapses with a growl, sending a shockwave as its death knell. She and Logan alone are able to keep to their feet as the short but potent quake rolls through.

In the settling dust, Sparrow almost cannot recognize her son. His face is hard and determined as he looks toward the foe that he played no small part in vanquishing. Pride lights Logan's eyes, he still has his pistol in hand ready to fight on if need be. The stance he takes is not unfamiliar in itself, only she is used to seeing someone else wear it.

A pang echoes in Sparrow's chest as Logan turns toward her. All of the hardness melts away; his brown eyes soften and his shoulders slouch. There's still enough of a child in him that when he sees his mother that he knows he doesn't have to be brave any longer.

He still tries so hard, Avo bless him. Even as she runs to her boy and pulls him into her arms, he clings tremulously to his pride.

"What were you thinking?!" Her voice sounds too high, like a squawk and she hates it. Holding Logan back an arm's length, she looks him up and down, running her hands over his sides and turning his head. Not a scratch on him, thank goodness. She grasps his face in her hands pulling him down—when did he grow a head above her? "Don't you ever do anything like that again! You could've been killed!"

Logan bites his lip; he's doing his best not to smile. "Mother, _you're_ the one who's injured." He can't quite keep the laughter from his voice.

"I don't care about me," she counters.

"Well, I do," he pushes right back. "I'm not ready to be a king just yet, Mother."

Well that…Sparrow has nothing to say to that. Her mouth opens and closes and then opens again while she struggles to find words. In the end, there are none to be had, instead she pulls her son back into her arms. Logan is stiff for a moment, but he eventually slumps and lays his head against her shoulder. His heart hammers wildly not far from her own.

"Don't worry," she says after a moment. "You won't be burdened by the crown for a long, long time, darling. I promise."

* * *

**Author's Note: **So I originally intended this to be a story in four parts, three chapters for Sparrow and the finale all for Reaver. That however, fell to hell when I started plotting Reaver's chapter and the sneaky bastard got an extra chapter, extending the story to five parts. Well, apparently Sparrow was jealous because there is just so much I wanted to cover for her that, after extending her final chapter to twelve parts instead of the usual eight, there was _still_ just so much left—not to mention so many damn pages taken up—that last night I said "fuck it" and gave the Queen what she wanted. So, in short, there are now six parts to this story. I'm sorry that this took so long, it got away from me on top of graduating, moving, and job hunting. Chapter four will be along and hopefully it will _not_ turn into a million-headed hydra. Thanks for your patience and thank you again to everyone who reads, reviews, and supports this ficlet. You are awesome.


	4. Or What Fades Away

**Disclaimer:** Microsoft and Lionhead own the rights to the Fable franchise. Please only sue me if you're willing to take me into indentured servitude and erase my student debt. I'd probably be okay with that, to be honest.

Also, before you begin, I highly suggest that you look up these songs and give them a listen during your reading. They were pretty inspirational. They're collected in the story's 8Tracks too by the way...

Sarah MacLachlan—Stupid

Carina Round—For Everything A Reason

We Are The Fallen—I Am Only One

Now on with the show.

* * *

**1.**

When Walter Beck first stumbled across Sparrow's path, he had been fourteen, scrawny, and full of fire. He's no longer fourteen and certainly not scrawny but the fire is still there. She likes that fire too. How else can she possibly feel about it? She all but raised him and cultivated that plucky streak. Sometimes she regrets it.

"We could turn it into a port," he says, doggedly following her elbow as she heads from the throne room to her study.

"We already have a port," she reminds him. "Two, in fact, both of them rather large. Or have Bloodstone and the harbor that this castle overlooks been faltering whilst my back was turned?"

Walter growls low in his throat, just as she does when vexed. She really has taught him everything. The poor thing.

They enter her study where Jasper is setting down lunch and this afternoon's statements that need her review.

"My, there are a stack of these today," she says picking up the topmost of the papers. Just returned with Logan from their tour, she has a thousand things to look over. And a thousand more things on top of just what was missed while she was on the road, unexpectedly fighting Trolls with her boy. Marcella, ever the campaigner, is throwing a ball to celebrate Logan's triumph, and so Sparrow must now be barraged by tailors and planners under her wife's command so that the event runs smoothly.

The crown, Sparrow believes most of the time, should be built into the seat of the throne rather than placed upon the head. That way she could really _feel_ it biting her in the ass.

Jasper, meanwhile, has given her a nod and placed a goblet of chilled wine in her free hand. Avo bless the lad. "Estate taxes are in review, Your Majesty. Her Royal Highness must have your approval on the raises and decreases that she's proposed."

Sparrow grunts as she sits down at her desk. "It's that time of year again, is it?"

"As it is every year, Madame."

Hmm. Perhaps Skorm should bless the lad. His back is turned to her while he arranges her plate but Sparrow can still feel Jasper smirking. Cheeky brat, just like Walter. And just like Walter, she only has herself to blame.

There are times in which Sparrow muses that she became a mother long before she gave birth to Logan.

"So you won't reconsider?" Walter asks. He looks just like Rosie as he crosses his arms. Or maybe it's Rosie that looks like him; the girl certainly spends enough time at his heels.

Sparrow sighs, "No. Not today, not any day in the future. Be content with what we've conquered of the Wraithmarsh so far and forget about Oakvale."

She doesn't add "just as I do" though the words sorely bite the tip of her tongue. There aren't many real regrets hanging about in the back of Sparrow's wardrobe. There was nothing that she could do for Rose or Thorne; she knows that now, with many years between herself and the loss of them.

One of the more haunting regrets that sits sincere and never far to the back, is her visit to the Shadow Court. She has nightmares of it still, of the girl whose hands she pressed the Dark Seal into.

Her pleas and sobs echo clear even now. Sparrow tries to explain herself every time; how she can't afford to hand over her youth, not when she has yet to face Lucien. Her strength must be preserved, for all of Albion, for the _world_.

It's never enough. It will never be enough.

Most of the time, Sparrow can parcel the blame to Reaver. He sent her there; it was his immortality that had to be protected. The truth always lurks close. Reaver sent _her_ with the seal; she chose to foist it upon another.

And that is why Oakvale will stay forever buried in fog and darkness. She can't bear for it to be otherwise.

Something must have passed across her face in the scant seconds that Sparrow looks up at him and back to her papers, because Walter's brow has furrowed. He's a pigheaded lad—well, a pigheaded _man_, she supposes, being in his forties now, but he's not stupid. At least not when it comes to reading his queen.

Disappointment lines his face but he nods and says nothing more. With a bow he is gone, off to tell Solomon and Swift of her decision, no doubt. As he goes, his cape flutters up drawing Sparrow's eye to a gilded mirror that's settled close to the door.

Nearly eighty-years-old and no gray hair or wrinkles. Sometimes, Sparrow wonders if there wasn't more to the deal that she made in those dark catacombs so long ago. It is a wonder that she buries—much like the cries of a young girl—beneath paperwork, dress fittings, and much later that night, a glass of wine and a strong sleeping tonic.

**2.**

The ball that Marcella arranges, on the eve of Logan's departure back to Brightwall, is a lovely affair. The surviving guards sang Logan's praises through every step of their journey, spreading word amongst the army as well as the common folk. Albion has become aware of her prince and more importantly, she has seen that he is capable.

Sparrow could not be more proud. Or more fearful.

"Red is really your color, has anyone ever told you that?" Reaver finds her later in the evening, as he always does, in the gardens stealing a breath of fresh air. He's carrying a fair-sized wooden box beneath one arm and artfully balancing two champagne flutes in his free hand.

She smiles at him and accepts one of the flutes. "My thanks. You look dashing as well." Not that Reaver ever looks anything _but_ dashing. Still, she does like him in blue, especially darker shades of it, they make his eyes seem brighter and his fair complexion not so washed-out. "I have to say though; I've heard that every color is my color. Funny how no one ever tells the queen when she looks garish, isn't it?"

"Oh, I think that I would," he tells her. "Unfortunately, you always manage to look stunning, so my criticisms are unnecessary." Reaver leans in, as if to inspect her necklace. His nose grazes her throat and Sparrow feels him inhale. "And considering some…_states_ I have seen Your Majesty in, I feel that I might be the _le spécialiste en la matière_."

Sparrow laughs even as a shiver rakes her backbone. "How fortunate I am for a friend like you then, hmm?"

He does not miss a beat, saluting her with his champagne. "As I have said many times myself, my Queen."

Things between them descend into a comfortable silence. They're removed from the center of the celebration but not so far that they can't see what's going on. Marcella is dancing with Turner who looks, for once in his life, wholly out of his element. Not too far away from them, Walter and Swift are vying for the attentions of Lady Daisy Dupris. Swift will win her; Marcella keeps Sparrow abreast of all juicy court gossip and she knows for a fact that the lovely Lady Daisy just adores men with fine moustaches.

Then, at the heart of the room, smiling politely and standing tall, is her son. Surrounded mostly by young men and women (especially young women), Logan is undoubtedly answering all of their questions about the battle with the Troll. She can hear him now, crediting his mother and her spells and how he really only aimed with luck and tried to avoid a boulder to the face. He's so humble and sweet; there are men twice his age that could learn something from her boy's conduct. But then she's his mother, she might very well feel that way if nerves got the best of him and he vomited all over his boots.

"So I hear," Reaver finally breaks the quiet, "that his Royal Highness squared off with a Swamp Troll. Most exciting."

"Most terrifying, you mean," Sparrow corrects, wrinkling her nose at him. "I swear my heart almost gave out."

He leans closer, setting his package on the marble balustrade behind them. "Well, that would have been far less of a reason to throw a party, wouldn't it?" The words are earnest—as earnest as Reaver can be anyway. At a sideways glance, Sparrow finds that his smirk is far less saturated and puissant. His bright blue eyes shift from her to Logan, accompanying the pressure of his palm upon the small of her back.

"Whether or not it was a pleasant experience though, he does seem to have come out of it unscathed," he offers. Again, there's that earnestness creeping about the undertones of Reaver's words. It disappears when his attentions revert to her and his mouth resumes its usual salacious curl. "As did you, Majesty. Your beauty is superb and unblemished."

But Sparrow isn't in the mood to flirt. A hole has opened at the bottom of her belly, one that she's been suppressing ever since the battle with the Troll.

"He looked just like you." She feels him stiffen at the words, hears a sharp intake of breath. "The way that he held his pistol, the way that he ran; all of it was you."

Not since Sparrow told Reaver that she was pregnant with Logan have either of them acknowledged aloud what he is to her children. Their unspoken agreement to never bring up Logan and Rosie's paternity is a part of that intangible Line that runs between them. Admitting the truth wrinkles the Line, thins it, and that's dangerous. Not only for her but for him and certainly for the children.

And yet, at this moment, they both cannot resist testing that barrier.

"Did he now?" Reaver's voice is softer and a touch less wry; if she didn't know him as she does, Sparrow probably wouldn't catch the difference. His hand moves across her back until his fingers can curve around her hip. Far too informal for as many people that could see them but Sparrow can't make herself care. Into Reaver she leans, just enough that her head brushes his collar.

"He did," she says.

The hand on her hip squeezes. "You don't think that he might be…You know?"

Sparrow very nearly buries her face in the silk of Reaver's jacket. "Don't. Please, don't say that." She swallows down against the ever-widening vacuum in her stomach. "That's the last thing that I want for him _or_ for Rosie."

"Given their…stock, that might be a big wish," he doesn't sound smug when he says it. He doesn't sound apologetic either. Reaver's face is carefully blank when Sparrow lifts her gaze; on another, she might call such a thing sympathy. "Besides, it isn't like Archon blood doesn't have its perks."

"I don't want them to be Heroes I want them to be happy!" she says with far more vitriol than she should. Sparrow pulls from Reaver's touch as his eyebrows rise. It's giving too much away to continue; she knows that, but the hole in her belly shares a nerve with her tongue and won't let the latter stop. "Being a Hero is nothing but a misery!"

He rolls his eyes at her. He actually has the audacity to roll his eyes. "You're exaggerating. Being a Hero is a grand time if you know how to stay relaxed." And joking now. "Take _moi_, for example. I'm perfectly happy with the 'Hero' life."

She should not expect any less of Reaver, she knows that. And yet she does. The hole morphs into a vice, crawling up into her chest, and _squeezing_. "No you're not."

Reaver does not flinch, he does not scowl, he does not even look away. She has struck something though, she sees it, watches something deep, deep down in the black of his pupils shudder and knows that something has been pierced. She is not sorry. Standing toe-to-toe atop the Line with him, Sparrow doesn't have the strength to be mindful tonight.

Logan's prowess with a pistol and Rosie's eyes are red flags for a terrible fate that she might have consigned them to. A fate where they could lose everything by choice or by default; one that will curse them to carry an abyss inside that never quite fills, no matter how many enemies they should slay, how much power and wealth they may amass, or even how much they might sacrifice. More than anything in this moment, Sparrow does not have the strength to let Reaver go on believing that she doesn't know how plagued he is too.

Whatever might erupt in the quickly cooling air between them is truncated by one of Sparrow's favorite sounds in the world.

"Mummy!"

She turns without thinking and without realizing that she's crying. Not an impossible sight to redirect however. Forcing a grin, she laughs as if she has been for quite some time.

Rosie doesn't notice anything amiss. Her charge doesn't break until she collides with Sparrow, flinging both arms around her middle. Behind her, her big brother is less easily deceived.

"Mother, are you all right?" Logan asks. His eyes dart between herself and Reaver, and his brow furrows. All of her son's knowledge of his father comes from court and gossip; neither of which ever paint Reaver well. Not that he deserves to be.

"Fine, darling, fine," she dabs at the moisture on her eyes with her knuckles, flicking it away. Her lie is as effortless as one Reaver himself might tell. "Lord Reaver was just telling me a few jokes."

"What about?" Rosie chirps, looking at Reaver with a bright smile. And brighter eyes, Sparrow's chest aches if she watches those two pairs of blue meet.

Whatever he may be feeling toward her at this moment, Reaver does not redirect it toward her daughter. He smiles down at her almost pleasantly. "Things I fear that your benevolent mother would not have you hear until you're at least thirty if ever," he tells her and Sparrow is almost impressed with how he can lie using the truth.

Rosie wrinkles her nose. "That's no fun," she tell him.

"Indeed it isn't," Reaver agrees with a dramatic sigh. Rosie giggles.

"Did you need something, sweetheart?" Sparrow asks, trying not to notice any similarities between her daughter's smile and Reaver's. She absentmindedly runs her fingers through Rosie's curls while looking at Logan.

Her son, still eyeing both she and Reaver, nods. Before he can speak though, his sister charges ahead.

"He wants you to dance with him, Mummy!" she laughs as if it were a secret, breaking out of Sparrow's embrace to spin about. Restless girl.

Logan sighs; thankfully, he sounds nothing like Reaver. "Mama announced that the next dance would be the Prince's Choice. Save me. Please."

Her laugh is real when it comes this time. "All of those pretty young ladies in there and you have to ask your doddering old mother? I've never heard of such a thing." Without thinking, Sparrow looks back at Reaver and asks, "Have _you_ ever heard of a strapping, sixteen-year-old lad doing such a thing?"

He plays along. "Your Majesty is hardly doddering nor do you look a day past thirty." With a sniff toward the ballroom, his smirk deepens. "And with all of the matchmaking mothers in there, just salivating to see what His Royal Highnesses tastes might be, one can hardly blame him for wishing to duck behind your skirts."

Surprisingly, Logan does not appear offended about the insinuation that he's using his mother to hide. On the contrary, the corners of his mouth twitch. "I'd duck behind my sister's but I'm afraid they aren't quite voluminous enough."

Reaver laughs at that, a very short and candid sound that Sparrow hasn't often heard. It strikes her, when she hears that laugh and looks at her children, that the four of them haven't been in the same place before, or at least they haven't while a real conversation was had.

"Of course I'll dance with you," she says moving to take Logan's arm before her mind can wander far on the subject of Reaver and her children. At least farther than it's already gone. She's going to need a sleeping tonic tonight, she can feel it.

"A moment, if Her Majesty will allow," Reaver cuts off the exit that she was so sure was secured. Before she can think of an excuse to urge Logan on, he has crossed the ten or so feet to them. The box that he carried out into the garden is in hand again and he pops it open while offering it to her son.

A pistol is in the box. It's larger than the one that Logan normally carries but certainly not the size of a Dragonstomper. Wood and metal both pristinely polished, Sparrow can make out an inlay of mother-of-pearl in the white oak handle. Four augment slots are etched into the cylinder and an elegant carving of leaves lines the barrel. There is no doubt in Sparrow's mind that this pistol is as deadly as it is pretty.

"I thought," Reaver says, "that perhaps His Royal Highness might need a weapon worthy of Troll slaying now that he's picked such a pastime."

Both she and Logan are taken aback by the gift. Not Rosie though, but then nothing can really surprise that girl. While her mother and brother stare openmouthed at the pistol, _she_ pushes forward to get a better look. She would probably do more than look but Sparrow isn't so dumbstruck that she doesn't know what the twitching in those little hands means.

"Wow!" Rosie exclaims. "Can I—?"

"No." She and Logan say it at the exact same time. Sparrow smiles at her son as she pulls his sister away from the box.

"Aww." Rosie hides her pout into the waist of Sparrow's gown.

"I—um—" It's been several years since her son has been made speechless; Sparrow would appreciate it far more if she weren't in the same boat. Clearing his throat, he stands a little straighter, attempting to right himself. "What I mean to say is thank you, Lord Reaver. This is most kind of you."

"Yes it is," she agrees. She looks up at Reaver and he stares back. The smile on his face is perfectly genial and polite; the mask is up and there will be no getting under it.

"I contribute to my homeland as best I am able," he says.

"Are you going to try it out, Logan?" Rosie asks. "Can I carry the box?"

Ever patient with his little sister, Logan chuckles and tugs on her pigtail. "It's a little late for target practice, isn't it? Besides, I don't think Mama would let either of us out of the ball."

"She probably would not," Sparrow says. "She certainly wouldn't let me. And I _do_ know that if I don't get to run off and play then neither do you two."

"For the best, I'm sure," Reaver says. Closing the box he nods to Logan and then to her. "I'll drop this off with that little valet fellow of yours, shall I? Enjoy your dance, Majesties."

Her son nods, and extends his hand toward Reaver. Sparrow watches their hands clasp, light and formal, and she thinks that this is the first time that they have ever touched, save for the one time Reaver held Logan as a newborn. "Of course. Thank you again, Lord Reaver, I'll make good use of your gift, I assure you."

Reaver bows deeply after their hands part. "You're your mother's son, so I don't doubt that, Highness."

Delight absolutely radiates from Logan. "Thank you."

"Yes, thank you," she says. Her gaze lingers with Reaver's for a moment longer; she searches for traces of movement again in his pupils but they're locked tight. It feels too abrupt, more should be said, but she's not sure what. In the end, Marcella's voice calling Logan back into the ballroom has him turning, and with her arm in her son's, Sparrow puts Reaver behind her.

Rosie is not so inclined.

Peering back, Sparrow finds her daughter standing before Reaver still, returning the eyebrow he raises to her with a downright regal stare.

"When _I_ kill my first Troll, I want a sword, not a gun," she says, so utterly serious in that way only children can pull off when making a proclamation. The inclination that Sparrow has to remind her daughter of her manners dissipates as Reaver laughs again. Earnest and short, just as with Logan, he cocks his head at the girl.

"And will you kill many Trolls, _ma princesse_?" he asks.

"Yes." So boldly and honestly, as if she'd been asked what color the sky was.

And Sparrow's heart sinks with the feeling that it might be true.

**3.**

Enjoying the still-warm autumn sunlight and the slowly changing colors of the gardens, Sparrow has taken her work outdoors today. It's all just papers that she has to read, missives to work on new roads, regulations for the factories starting to pop up everywhere in the new "industrial" area of Bowerstone, those sorts of things. Marcella is with her, to clarify and enjoy the atmosphere as well.

"How many of these are from Reaver?" Sparrow asks her wife as she comes across what has to be the fifteenth form requesting a lease and permission to build on crown lands. He's adopted a new seal which somehow makes the thought of him even more pretentious than it already was.

Marcella shrugs, though a smile lurks in her green-blue eyes. "I didn't count. His man however, arrived at the gates with a few crates."

Sparrow sighs. They haven't spoken since the ball; he was gone by the time that she finished dancing with Logan. She will never claim the ability to understand Reaver; no one understands Reaver, Sparrow has her sincere doubts that _Reaver_ understands Reaver most of the time. Still, it probably wouldn't be silly to guess, what with his abrupt departure to Millfields and the many, many, _many_ forms arriving at her door—which he knows for a fact give her headaches—that Reaver isn't thinking of her with any kindness at the moment.

Going on three-hundred-years-old and he's more of a child than either of the two that he put inside of her.

"Set whatever is left in the crates on fire," she tells Marcella as she sets her cache of papers aside and stands. Sparrow cracks her back and rubs the space between her eyes with her knuckles. "Then return the ashes to him. The tit."

Her wife laughs. "Now, now, Majesty, temper. After all, Lord Reaver has been a most passionate_…supporter_ of the crown for many years." The smile that Marcella is trying to hide blooms into a grin when Sparrow begins to glower. "Come on, now, I already had my clerks sort through the pile and throw the petty ones out. He does actually have a few lucrative proposals in here."

"I'll lucrative proposal his ass with my axe," she grumbles.

Marcella doesn't bat an eyelash. "That is entirely between you and him, my love."

Torn between wanting to laugh or throw something at Marcella's head (perhaps both), the sound of giggling captures Sparrow's attention before she can decide. Leaning against the nearby balustrade, she spies Rosie, wooden sword in hand, as she leads the little Von Wische boy through an overhang of sweet autumn clematis. They're playing "Warrior Princess" no doubt, Rosie's favorite game with any and all who might be cajoled into it.

Sparrow isn't keen on the game. While Rosie may have taken Sparrow's tears to heart after the Hobbe incident to never, ever go exploring alone again, she's still set on being an adventurer one day. It's a wish that her mother constantly prays remains unfulfilled.

At this moment however, Sparrow is happier to see the girl playing that game than she is fearful. Usually, Rosie spends a good two or three weeks after Logan's departure to school sulking in her rooms. He left not five days ago this autumn, and she has never seen her daughter laughing so soon after dreaded "school time" comes along.

She has also never seen her daughter grab another child by the collar of his shirt and pull him in for a kiss.

"Oh my." Marcella is at her elbow. Sparrow didn't see or hear the other woman approach and the surprise nearly makes her jump. "_That's_ a different game, isn't it?"

She blinks a few times, making sure she is indeed watching her six-year-old daughter kiss her favorite playmate before responding. "Well, it isn't hopscotch. Not unless the rules have drastically changed since I was her age."

"Hmm, old as you are, my dear, the rules indeed have not changed so much," Marcella says.

With a roll of her eyes, Sparrow elbows her consort. Gently of course, but the redhead still gets a nudge. In spite of that, Sparrow has to smile. "I think we should just be glad Logan isn't here to spy with us." A grand understatement. If she is overprotective of her brood, then her son is smothering when it comes to his sister. Logan would swaddle Rosie up in a tower if he had his way, the little worrywart. Sparrow has no doubts that he would react rather unkindly to his baby sister kissing boys in the garden.

Marcella coughs delicately into her fist. "Agreed. Poor darling, I've never seen a man as old as that boy."

Sparrow hums her agreement. Meanwhile, Rosie has stopped kissing the Von Wische lad. His face is pinker than the nearby crocus blooms and he wears the look of a boy gob-smacked by the hand of Avo. Poor, sweet thing. And Rosie, well, Rosie seems content with all of this. Blue eyes alight and giggling, she takes Elliot's hand and raises her sword with the other, leading him off to conquer the duck pond.

Alex is who _should_ come to mind when she watches the display of puppy love romping through her garden, or so Sparrow believes. He was her first in everything and she had loved him dearly. But wonderful, sensitive, kind Alex did not press the sweetest kiss that she can recall upon her lips.

Sparrow drags her eyes away from her daughter to the pile of papers on the table. Reaver's new stamp flashes boldly in the sunlight, almost as if it's winking at her. She misses him and doesn't feel quite as guilty about that as her conscious tells her she should.

**4.**

Reaver's grudge lasts only a week or so longer. If the problem can't be shot away then he tends to turn it into his favor. Since shooting her is off the table—not that Sparrow doesn't believe he took a moment to consider it—he's back to playing nicely with the crown. Or so that is the impression she gets when invitations to the Final Fall Fox Hunt in Millfields arrive for the royal family. As always where the little lakeside hamlet is concerned, Reaver is hosting the event.

Sparrow makes the trip a day ahead of Marcella, Rosie, and the rest of court to make sure things are smoothed over. She even takes a gift; "Dead" Ned Martin's lucky revolver. Her early appearance is clearly unexpected, or so she judges by the scantily clad guests milling about his manse when she arrives, but not unwelcome. She judges _that_ by seeing Reaver push a young man (maybe, it's very hard to pronounce a gender when everyone is just _so_ pretty in their corsets, silk stockings, and masks) out of his lap the second that she walks into the room.

Taking a moment to enjoy his surprise Sparrow coyly presents the gift then flounces up to the quarters that will officially belong to her and Marcella during their visit. She watches the guests leave in a hurry from the balcony while waiting for Reaver. He doesn't disappoint; not ten minutes pass and up he comes along with a bottle of champagne. They don't do much talking but Sparrow considers their discrepancies at an end by the time that dawn rolls around and neither of them can move. She awakes in the most pleasant haze which seems to follow her throughout the day.

"Would their Royal Majesties care to accompany me on a tour of the hunting grounds?" Reaver asks as the servants begin clearing the luncheon dishes. Marcella had arrived not long ago with Rosie and their royal entourage, just in time for the midday meal. And, most likely, to give Sparrow enough time to look decent, queenly, and most certainly _not_ as if she's sharing a bed with Reaver.

"I will have to decline, I fear," Marcella says as she sets down her tea. "So many letters to write and so little time." She winks at Sparrow. "Don't let me stop you though, dearest. You go on and have a lovely time."

There are days when Sparrow could not be more confident in her decision to marry her late-husband's mistress.

"Can I go too?" Rosie asks, at once losing all interest in the chocolate pudding that she'd grudgingly swallowed every steamed carrot on her plate to get. She looks eagerly between Sparrow and Reaver. The girl has asked about him several times since the ball. No doubt, she has that pistol in mind still. Or rather, that sword she said that she wanted for _her_ first Troll kill.

While they might actually take a ride through the woods, Sparrow knows without a doubt what Reaver was really implying. As much as she loves her daughter, she'd rather like to have the afternoon to see just what he had in mind.

"Darling—" she scours for an excuse.

Out come the big eyes and trembling lower lip. "Please, Mummy? Please, please, _please_?! I ate all of my vegetables! _And_ I finished my reading lessons for the week before we got here! Ask Mama! Mama, tell Mummy!"

Marcella's eyes twinkle in a way that Sparrow knows cannot bode well. "Well, she has been very good…"

There are days when Sparrow rues her decision to marry her late-husband's mistress.

"See?!" Rosie all but flings herself onto her knees.

"Sweetheart…" It is so hard to say "no" to that face. Cursedly hard. Sparrow can't imagine how in Avo's name that poor Von Wische boy is going to stand a chance against her in just a few short years.

Luckily—or unluckily, depending upon perspective—Sparrow doesn't have to dash Rosie's hopes to smithereens.

With a smile that Sparrow cannot call saccharine, Reaver nods to her daughter. "I would be more than honored to be accompanied by Her Majesty _and_ Her Royal Highness."

Rosie makes a high-pitched noise of glee, not at all unlike a puppy, and Sparrow has no hope of denying her request now. She sighs. "All right. Go on; go have Genevieve dress you for a ride."

Another gleeful squeal and all that's left of Rosie is a blur of blue ruffled pinafore, sprinting out of the dining room. Sparrow wrinkles her noise in Marcella's direction as her wife rises.

_Don't think I won't remember this_, she tells her silently, eyebrow flagged high.

Marcella only grins back as if to say, _I know you won't. But it was worth it_. And then she's making her way upstairs to "write letters" or more honestly, to balance the household ledger and fuck her newest valet in secured peace. Clever bitch.

"I hope you know what you've acquiesced to," she says, standing to go and change as well. Best to fix herself before Marcella has her newest toy stripped and mounted. Elsewise things might become awkward should Sparrow need to send Jasper into her wife's rooms to borrow a hairpin or some such nonsense.

At the table's other end, Reaver's face is unreadable. He has a wine glass against his lips, keeping his mouth well hidden behind the crystal and his eyes focused upon the gilded rim. She can feel him smirking though, so Sparrow leaves him to his self-satisfied silence.

Jasper, making a very astute guess from Rosie's squealing as she barreled upstairs, has already taken it upon himself to arrange her riding clothes. He is prepared before she even makes it up to her quarters and has Sparrow redressed in almost no time at all. The brushing and braiding of her hair is a slightly different story.

In part, that's due to Jasper's finicky insistence when it comes to haircare. The other part might be due to the fact that she hasn't exactly done more than tie it back since the previous nights…_exercises_. Jasper can tell, so he takes his sweet time, grumbling about split ends and tangles.

Her valet's stylistic tendencies eat up what is very close to an hour. Sparrow expects to find Rosie lying at the bottom of the main stairwell, weeping about how long adults take. She also expects Reaver, who treats his appearance with more care than _any_ noble that she's ever met, to still be in his own chambers choosing the perfect cravat. What she finds is an empty stairwell and, upon investigation, that Reaver has gone ahead to the stables. _With_ Rosie.

She doesn't think that Reaver would do anything to hurt the girl. That would be stupid of him for many reasons, not the least of which involves upsetting one of the few people alive who very well might succeed in killing him if she deigned to try. Still, even with that in mind, Sparrow finds her legs taking a swift path to the stables.

Whatever she was subconsciously imagining could be happening, nothing compares to what she actually walks in on.

There's a pony. A lovely, diminutive dapple-gray with delicate features and large, gentle eyes. Fitted with an embossed leather starting saddle, it is the absolute perfect thing for a little girl who might, coincidentally, just be learning how to ride. And Reaver is presenting it to Rosie.

Kneeling on one knee, he holds the pony's reigns in one hand as Rosie fawns over it. Sparrow doesn't need to see the bright smile on her daughter's face or hear her giggling as her small hands reverently stroke its soft nose, to know how entranced she is with the creature already. She's a grown woman, and a_ she_ wants to pet it too.

Sparrow refrains however, intent on watching Reaver and her daughter unnoticed.

"Here." He takes Rosie's hands and has her gently cup just beneath the pony's muzzle. "Blow in her nose. Softly."

Rosie laughs, "Why?"

Reaver answers her, not a hint of disdain or impatience in his tone. "That's how you let a horse know your scent, _ma princesse_. If they learn your scent then they learn to trust you." His nose wrinkles, though not at Rosie. "My word, what _is_ your riding instructor teaching you? To look pretty and wave?"

Rosie's nose wrinkles up _just like his_. "He doesn't even let me hold the reigns most of the time. It's so boring!"

"So it sounds," Reaver agrees. "Your mother should have the fool executed."

While Sparrow cannot doubt that there is at least a touch of sincerity that suggestion, Rosie hasn't her insight. She giggles at the strange joke and Reaver...Reaver does not appear to be annoyed by the sound.

The corner of his mouth twitches and he nods again to the pony. "Go on. Softly, remember."

"Yes, sir," she says. Just as directed, Rosie puffs her cheeks and blows against the pony's muzzle. The creature, in response, butts its forehead gently to hers causing a new fit of giggles.

The Line is being nudged again. Gently, perhaps unconsciously. No, Reaver doesn't do anything unconsciously. But then…_why_? The pistol had the benefit of ingratiating him to his future king. What does giving a pony to the child who isn't the heir accomplish for Reaver?

There is a sliver of a second, as Reaver helps Rosie into the saddle, instructing her to guide with her knees, in which Sparrow can almost believe that no ulterior motive lurks beneath this moment. But that would be foolish. Utterly and absolutely asinine. Because this is Reaver and he does nothing without calculating a profit for himself. Even if it's presenting his…Rosie with a pony.

Only an idiot would let herself think otherwise.

**5.**

Midwinter can be trying, what with all of the parties that surround the holiday, but there _are_ bright spots amidst the cold and snow. Sparrow enjoys strong-arming the nobility into numerous charitable donations for Albion's less fortunate; all in the spirit of the season, of course. Having Logan home from school for a month is wonderful as well; she's always happiest with both of her children near.

Not that she can't find ways to content herself on the rare occasion when they aren't about. Even if she couldn't, Reaver would think something up. Such is the situation this afternoon while Logan is off with some school mates and Walter has taken Rosie and her little friends out sledding.

How or who initiated it all is something that she can't quite remember; one moment they're sharing spiced brandy in her study, discussing the warehouse district and the next she's has her hand down his trousers and his pulse point between her teeth. Reaver knocks everything from her desk—something she can chide him for later—before setting her on its edge, flipping her skirt back, and tugging her smalls off in one quick move. Sparrow is still impressed by that finesse even after thirty years and countless demonstrations.

Hammer would be less than impressed by it. But then Hammer is a monk who hasn't had her skirts flipped up in ages if ever; Sparrow has always been suspect of the bawdy stories surrounding Hammer while _she_ was indentured within the Tattered Spire. But the other Hero enters the room after he's done it so there's really no telling.

"By the Light!"

All right, Hammer definitely wouldn't be impressed, she would be horrified, which conveniently is the exact emotion taking up all of the space not already claimed by shock on her face right now.

Putting the Cullis Gate in her office was supposed to be a boon, not a blunder. Though, in Sparrow's defense both Hammer and Garth usually write before they visit. And since Theresa hasn't popped in all doom and gloom, then it means that she is indeed just visiting and no earth shattering emergencies are about to fall onto Sparrow's plate.

Well, other than the one where her oldest friend walks in on her post-coitus, half-naked, and still joined with Reaver, of course.

"Shit," Sparrow whispers. If she hadn't just climaxed, the mortification of being walked in on with her tits out and Reaver still hilted inside of her might just kill her. Luckily, the blood is still largely circulating below her beltline so she isn't in any danger there.

Reaver has no sense of shame so he doesn't even remove his hand from the back of her thigh or lower it as he glances over to the Cullis Gate. A smile is flashed at their interloper. "Ah, Hammer, you're looking well. I would extend an invitation for you to join us, my dear, but I'm afraid that your arrival was just barely too late. Give me a few moments however, and we can certainly try a second round."

"Oh no." Sparrow can see the apoplexy rising even before the words hit Hammer.

The other woman's face flushes so fast that now Sparrow is surprised that _she_ isn't dying. Or at the very least fainting. Even Hero constitutions have limits.

"You—you_—get off of her, Reaver_!" Hammer barrels toward the desk as if she means to rip Reaver's head straight from his shoulders. Actually, there's no "as if" about it, if Hammer gets hold of him, he's losing his damn head.

On another day, Sparrow might not disagree with that course of action. Today though, she very much prefers Reaver alive and rushes to intercept her friend. Or rather, she tries. Legs still fairly numb from recent orgasm don't take direction very well. What she attempts to do is unclench them from around Reaver's waist and stand, what she does is almost land on the floor and knock her head on the desk as she goes.

She is saved by Reaver; he catches her ungainly flail and pulls her upright, supporting her on her feet. Furthermore, he goes so far as to turn, making a shield of himself in light of her open and perhaps ripped shirt. It's almost gentlemanly.

"Hammer—_Hannah_, stop!" Sparrow commands while trying to re-button her blouse. She doesn't bother with fixing her bodice-vest or smoothing her skirt. She doesn't bother trying to locate her smallclothes either. She's fairly certain that Reaver might have ripped them anyway.

The sound of her birth name stops Hammer's charge. In contrast, it emboldens Reaver and he makes a none-too-subtly move for his pistol. Sparrow grabs his wrist just as he palms the handle.

"Don't you dare," she warns, even as she clings to him with jellied-knees.

"I'm only protecting your virtue, my Queen," he says with a straight face as he stands there, still untucked and unbuttoned from his trousers. At any other time, surely a riotous combination. Right now, Sparrow swats his arm.

"I'm fairly certain that was gone over a decade before we even met," she tells him. "Now if you would please just _not_?"

Reaver makes a show of sighing and rolling his eyes but in the end he acquiesces. He even rights himself in his pants without her having to point it out.

Meanwhile, Sparrow has her shirt as neat as she can get in the time given and faces Hammer. The other Hero's eyes are wide, flicking between her and Reaver. Sparrow's stomach clenches as astonishment fades more heavily into horror. Not the previous shade of horror, which had more to do with what she had popped in on than anything else. Oh no, currently Hammer's features are molding into something crueler than that, something rife with disgust and even worse, scorn.

A cannon ball's worth of disquiet rolls in Sparrow's belly as she looks up at her friend. "Hammer—"

"What are you doing?" Hammer demands, dark blue eyes flashing like a thunderstorm down upon Sparrow. "Are you insane? You're just making it easier for him to stab you in the back."

There has to be a third Heroic trait, one solely based upon Luck, otherwise Reaver wouldn't have survived so long on just Skill. Or so Sparrow decides when he laughs and says, "I believe that I have already done that. In several senses of the term."

"_Not helping_!" Sparrow tells him, sparing a moment to toss a glare over her shoulder. When she whips her head back to Hammer, she finds the other Hero's mouth agape. Her eyes flick between them; Sparrow can see the gears turning and that ball in her stomach rolls mercilessly, threatening to squash her innards.

Outside of herself and Reaver, Sparrow can count on one hand the people who know the full details of their affair; Hammer and Garth are not among those privileged. It seems however, that Hammer is stumbling into said privilege, or so Sparrow gathers from the light of realization dawning across her face.

"By the Light, how long…?" She claps a big hand to her mouth and the cannonball crashes up into Sparrow's ribs as Hammer's dismay does not dim. "Oh no…the _children_?"

The cannonball is forgotten when Hammer says that last word with such distaste. Sparrow would have taken Hammer's ill-opinions of what she's done; Avo knows that she has certainly never been proud of her tryst with Reaver. She hasn't exactly been ashamed of it, but she knows better than to revel in it or think too much on it. Her children however? Sparrow is infinitely proud of them, they are the light of her world, and Hammer won't taint that wonderful feeling even for a second. No. Absolutely not. Sparrow will _not_ allow it.

"Shut your damn mouth, Hammer." She's glowing; she can feel the lines of Will bursting forth and the almost imperceptible weight of wings sprouting from her shoulder blades. Hammer takes a step back.

More surprise is in the motion than anything else is. That surprise flares to anger in heartbeat. Hammer's meaty fists curl together and Sparrow doesn't doubt that like the mallet on the end of her weapon, they can turn bone to powder. "Excuse me?"

This is Sparrow's house and she does not back down, least of all while defending her nestlings. She takes a step forward, daring Hammer to swing. "I do _not_ owe you a single explanation for anything in my life and I didn't ask for opinions. My children are not a part of this and you will not make them a part of it." She doesn't add _or else_; she does not have to.

First, she is sure that Hammer is going to hit her. Anger crackles off of the other Hero like a shock spell. There is going to be a brawl in her study and she only hopes that Reaver will stay out of it. But then, just as Sparrow is prepared to stop time and grab an axe from the wall, the fury rolling from Hammer's whole body fizzles down as she sighs and looks away. It morphs into something even less welcome: disappointment.

Those dark blue eyes are heavy and sad when they meet Sparrow's again. Like her, Hammer has not aged much in the forty-odd years since they met. But she looks older now when she says, "I expected so much better from you."

The words sting, a deep, piercing pain that shoots venom straight beneath her ribs to the most vulnerable of spots. Sparrow could almost double over with the ache of it. She doesn't, but she also can't hide what it does; the corners of her eyes itch while the corners of her mouth tremble.

And Hammer is not done twisting the knife. "You are the Savior of Albion—it's Queen! Light forgive you, Sparrow, you've brought a monster into your bed! You're supposed to be a Hero!"

If Hammer had not added that hasty final sentence saturated with such disdain, then shame might have continued to eat away at Sparrow. But Hammer does add them and for Sparrow to hear them shatters that cannonball of ignominy like frosted glass. Rage wraps her up safely inside of its fire and all of the resentment that she has clung to since she put a bullet in Lucien's brain boils across her tongue.

"How dare you." Her voice is low but potent; Hammer must already taste the poison dripping from it because she steps back yet again. "You're really going to try and lecture me on what it means to be a Hero?"

Hammer attempts to fight back. "I—"

Sparrow does not let her. "Quiet. I was being rhetorical." She curls and uncurls her fingers in the fabric of her skirt; only the barest thread of control prevents a spell from blooming in her fists. "Have you forgotten what I've done? What I _had _to do because no one else volunteered for the job? Out of the four left with the Archon's mark, who stayed and picked up the mess that Lucien made, Hammer? Who tied herself to a crown and responsibility and everything else she never bloody well wanted?"

She is shaking now. Sparrow can feel the floor vibrate beneath the soles of her boots from the potency of her ire. If it doesn't splinter beneath her or burst into flames, she'll be very surprised. Still, she barrels on; these things she's never said have their own mind now and she is only their vessel.

"You went to the North to avoid what being a Hero really is and Garth buried himself in his studies to do the same. You _both_ ran off just like Reaver did and dumped ashes into my hands; the only difference was that I never expected _him_ to return and help!"

The words strike Hammer like a slap. Once, when Mother and Father were still alive, Sparrow had attempted to climb onto the roof of the barn, only to be stopped by Rose. In the ensuing tantrum, she had told Rose that she hated her. The pain that Hammer wears now is line-for-line an exact echo of her sister's in that moment so long ago. Unlike the wound that she inflicted upon Rose however, Sparrow is not drowned by remorse right after the words escape.

It is a hard thing to regret the truth, so she doesn't bother to try. Sparrow straightens herself, pretends that she is made of hard stone, impervious to warping from pressure outside of her or within her. "You do not get to stand there and condemn me for falling off a pedestal that you made and shoved me onto, Hannah." Sparrow clamps a steel-taloned fist about her heart. Lucien could not break her, this will not break her because she is stronger and she refuses to crack. "My affairs aren't any concern of yours. So, unless you are going to ease my burdens and do something real for the first time in forty years, you can go back to hiding your head in the snow because I don't need your reprimands over what _you think_ I'm doing wrong."

It's a death knell. She hears it the same as Hammer does. Sparrow wants Hammer to fight it. She wants an argument, anything other than such this bleary-eyed, crestfallen acceptance that seeps into the other woman's big shoulders, making them sag. Not for the first time, Hammer turns from her, but this time Sparrow will not beg her to stay.

Hammer blinks away through the Cullis Gate and Sparrow thinks again of Rose. It would seem that she's lost two sisters now. Only one of them was kind enough to die rather than abandoning her at the roadside.

Her rocky façade crumbles not ten seconds after Hammer leaves. Sparrow isn't made of stone or anything of the like and she knows it. She is fragile and thin and just as glass would, she cracks beneath the impact of Hammer's departure. Sagging to the floor, it's all that she can do to hold onto her pieces.

This has been a reminder; she is Hero alone in on this road, as she always has been. For all of the good in her life—her contented kingdom, her friends, her wonderful, wonderful children—ultimately Sparrow carries this millstone all by herself and it grinds her nearer to pulp with every step. Soon she will be dust.

The hesitant, almost soft hand that lays upon the back of her neck, Sparrow thrashes off. It is persistent however, and comes again, far less gently with its mate. They yank her back onto her feet, pulling her hard into a mussed waistcoat. They dig into her upper arms like steel when she struggles and swears, locking her in place against a rigid body that she knows well.

Sparrow does not trust Reaver. She _cannot_ trust Reaver. He is dangerous, human only in form anymore, after so long walking in the darkness, thinking only of himself. He can't offer her love or be a father to her children and she has no illusions that once their affair becomes inconvenient or a bore to him, he won't hesitate to walk away from her as well. If he even deigns to leave her alive.

Funny though. Hammer has walked away, for good it seems, and Garth has always been more of benevolent ghost occasionally sweeping through her life than a true friend, but Reaver is here. Not only that, he has fled and then returned multiple times, as if he couldn't sail off to conquer his own kingdom whenever he wishes. It isn't much, but it keeps Sparrow from hating herself too badly when she finally gives in and muffles her tears in the rumpled silk of his shirt.

He never palms his gun or guides a knife into her back. Reaver's hands remain steadfast, curved about her waist and the base of her skull. There is no tenderness beneath the touch but there _is_ solidity, a mountain's worth in fact, and in this moment, it is enough.

**6.**

Logan's birthday falls at the end of January, not long after he's returned to school. For the last two years, Sparrow, Marcella, and Rosie have travelled to Brightwall to celebrate the occasion with him. His seventeenth was set to be an exception only in that they intended to arrive early and surprise him with a weeklong stay, rather than just the usual two or three days. It turns out to be an exception several other ways, though the only one that Sparrow is first aware of is how Marcella will not be able to attend. Her consort contracts a slight fever and stomach cramps the day before they are scheduled to depart. Since Marcella won't risk the chance of spreading her bug to Logan or any of his schoolmates, Sparrow only takes Rosie, Jasper, and Walter with her through her Cullis Gate.

The second peculiarity of this year is discovering that Reaver is visiting her son as well.

For the first few seconds after she rounds the corner and finds him standing with Logan at his elbow, she is simply startled. And then she is…Sparrow can't quite find words for how she feels at the sight of her boy laughing while Reaver looks upon him with an almost-real smile. For the first time she notes that the two of them are of a height; an inch separates them, perhaps even less. It's a tad difficult to measure from as far back as she is. There is no difficulty in noticing how they stand the same, even though their poses differ. Straight-spines, even, shoulders, and a penchant to putting more weight on their right hip. And then, when Logan angles his head, there can be no mistaking where he gets the narrow curve of his jaw.

This isn't joy that echoes in her as she catches this candid moment but neither is it pain. Perhaps it could both. She doesn't have time to reflect upon it either. It won't be forgotten though; she couldn't if she tried.

It _is _pushed aside however, when, not a second later, her eyes flick to the chalkboard sign that hangs beside the doorway that Reaver stands in. In neat white letters, "Brightwall Troll Hunting Society" stands stark against its dark background.

"Your Majesty!" Her presence is noticed first by a short, barrel-chested young man with a shock of blond hair. One of Logan's friends, Daniel Silsbee. The boy who once dared to call his prince a bastard has become something of a shadow to Logan in the years since they both started attending Brightwall. Sparrow likes him well enough; Daniel seems to have grown out of the old-blood prejudices that had his father and grandfather ostracized from court. She isn't one for holding grudges over children anyway, especially when said child is among the very few who can always make her reserved son smile.

She meets Reaver's gaze; there is no fear in those bright blue eyes, but there is a certain amount of uneasiness. The kind one would see in the haunches of a cat caught testing his claws on the new drapes by an overindulgent mistress. Sparrow has a powerful urge to break his fingers but she reins it in. For the moment.

Like Reaver, Logan sees her and he knows when his hands are red. He glances at her, at the sign, at Reaver, and then back to her.

"Mother…" Whatever excuse her boy might be attempting to cook up falls flat as she closes the distance between them in a few brisk strides.

"Happy birthday, darling." She smiles and cups his cheek, pulling him down just far enough that she can press a kiss to his forehead. Behind her son, she spies half a dozen girls and boys around his age, all doing their best to bow without staring. Each of them carries some sort of firearm and there are padded targets set upon the wall behind them.

"Your Majesty, you are as radiant as always." Like the students, Reaver bows, not as deeply and certainly without any of the awe.

"Thank you, Lord Reaver." She nods to him, polite and regal smile still in place. "I didn't expect to see you here. What a lovely surprise." Sparrow doesn't wait for him to respond. She turns back to her son says, "_The Brightwall Troll Hunting Society_? Interesting, I don't remember reading about this in the new classes book that Samuel sent me."

A faint red tinge creeps up Logan's neck, staining his ears and the apples of his cheeks. She doesn't usually enjoy seeing her son made uncomfortable. _Usually_. Right now however, Sparrow finds a great deal of satisfaction in his fluster. "It—I—Ugh…"

Sparrow cuts him off with a wave. "Oh, never mind, you'll have plenty of time to tell me this week." She lays another kiss on his forehead before releasing him. "You should go and greet your sister. She's waiting down in the museum with Walter. Poor man; he's probably lost an arm to her already." Sparrow had thought Rosie's excitement might bother the other students and scholars, so she had requested Walter distract the girl with the weapons museum housed in the lower chambers of the academy, just above the catacombs. In retrospect, a very, very wise decision.

Logan balks, something that never happens when he knows she's ordering despite how polite and genial her tone may be. "Mother, I—"

Again, Sparrow waves his reply off. "Go on. I insist."

There is no way to mistake those words for anything but a dismissal. Even the boys and girls in the background know this and start to filter out. Logan doesn't mistake it but he continues to falter.

"Mother—" he starts, a little more determinedly than before.

Daniel is the one who cuts him off this time. Laying a hand on Logan's shoulder, the Silsbee boy shakes his head and wonder of wonders, Logan listens. That hand stays put as the young man bows deeply with a murmured, "Your Majesty", urging his prince on down the hallway.

Sparrow cocks an eyebrow as she watches them go. In seventeen years, she's never witnessed anyone, aside from herself or Marcella, who could calm her son so quickly. This is going to warrant further investigation.

Later. At this particular moment, Sparrow waits until her son and company have turned the corner before facing Reaver again. His smile has not faded but his stance has changed. His back is to the open path of the corridor; if she didn't know better, she would say that he was preparing to run. An absurd satisfaction blooms beneath her ribs at the idea, enough so that she decides to make him wish that he had.

While Reaver is Speed and Accuracy personified, Sparrow is not ungifted in those areas herself. And even if she can't match him (she can't and she knows it) she has other aptitudes to fall back on that he does not. Namely the ability to slow time with a snap of her fingers.

She does just that, despite the fact that Reaver isn't scurrying off or even looking away. When dealing with the Thief himself, it pays not to take chances. Color leaches out of the world around Sparrow as she takes hold of Reaver's vest collar and blinks them to the privacy of her sanctuary.

The second that they are safe within its magical walls she allows every drop of cold fury that has been accumulating since she first saw that sign to pour out. It nearly knocks Reaver over, and she doesn't even push when she lets him go—even if the temptation to shake him as a terrier would a rat is nigh overwhelming. She would enjoy hearing his even white teeth chatter uncontrollably.

Instead, she asks, "What in the bloody hell do you think you're doing?"

Reaver straightens his vest. "Being kidnapped, I believe. I would have thought that by now however, Her Majesty would know I would follow her anywhere that she might ask."

Jokes. Of course. How _could_ she expect different? Sparrow denies the impulse to stop time again and slap the smirk right off of his pretty face. She settles for cracking her knuckles as she glares him down.

"The only thing that Her Majesty is going to ask you is why you were with her son just now, attending a social group at his school. One that no one bothered to mention to her and which—if the name is anything to judge by—somehow involves pursuing very big and very dangerous monsters?"

Reaver isn't rattled. "I was simply in the—"

"_Don't_." Sparrow imagines the fury in her eyes might set him on fire. It certainly gives him pause. "Don't you dare lie to me. Not where my child is involved."

A shade passes across Reaver's face, a flicker of almost-but-not-quite-human disquiet. He erases that with a melodramatic sigh, cocking one hip to rest his fist on.

"I was _asked_ to come," he tells her. "The lad and his little chums wanted lessons and tips from the greatest marksman in all of history, what kind of citizen would I be to deny my prince?"

"One who wanted to stay in his _queen's_ good graces," she growls. "You aren't stupid, Reaver, why didn't you tell me?"

That shade returns; he hesitates. Blue eyes flick down to his wrist, as if there is something interesting on the cuff of his glove. An order for him to speak is on the tip of Sparrow's tongue when he finally moves on.

"His Royal Highness feared that if you knew, you wouldn't allow the meetings to go on," he says. A single, mocking eyebrow is raised. "I'd hazard to say that his assumptions were correct."

"Of course, they are!" Sparrow feels the words burst from her lips like a fireball. "He's seventeen! What business does he have playing at monster-hunter? Even if he _weren't _heir to the throne that is the very last thing he should be doing!" Another wave of pure want, concerning Reaver's cheekbone and the back of her hand, crashes over Sparrow. She drags her fingers through her hair in an attempt to squelch it. "I cannot believe—how could you do this?"

Perhaps it shouldn't shock her when that shadow returns and Reaver's gaze breaks from hers. A miniscule thing to anyone else, it makes _her_ whole world sway. Even more so when he finally looks back up and says, with no hint of sarcasm, "Because someone has to make sure that the boy knows how to handle himself."

Dumbstruck, Sparrow can only stare for several long seconds. She expected him to shrug his shoulders, chuckle and say something about never turning down a request from the crown-to-be. Or perhaps, for him to tell her how much gold Logan and his friends had offered along with the flimsy excuse of what a waste it would be should they spend such wealth on a less talented instructor. There are a few thousand selfish and self-important things that he could have cited to her in this moment, and Sparrow would have believed every single one.

When she finds her voice, it feels thinner, as if the muscles in her throat have been drawn over-tight like bowstrings. "That isn't for you to take upon yourself."

Reaver regards her from behind a mask of cold blue eyes and straightly set lips. If he were a Will user, Sparrow knows there would be icicles in her hair right now. "I beg to differ, Your Majesty."

"Beg for difference all you want," Sparrow says, "that doesn't make it your place. I'm his mother; _I_ am the one who decides on how he needs to handle himself."

The shadow flickers again right before Reaver says, "And his father isn't permitted any sort of opinion on the matter?"

"_You are not his father_." She doesn't raise her voice but Sparrow brings it come between them like the head of her axe. Something in the depths of Reaver's pupils flashes, the closest he'll ever come to flinching.

A foolish part of Sparrow regrets the words, but she smothers it without pause. The Line exists for a reason: to protect her children. Reaver isn't allowed that word, nor that phrase or any like it. Not where it concerns Logan and Rosie.

Sparrow licks her lips. "Seventeen years and seven months ago, when I told you that I was with child, you asked me two questions." She holds up her right hand, flicking up her index finger. "The first was if I was going to keep it and I told you yes. The second," up goes her middle finger, "was if I expected you to raise it with me and I answered no." She curls both fingers along with their mates into a fist, allowing her arm to fall back down as she does. "You didn't protest then, it's too late to do it now."

_That_ strikes something under the skin. His chin goes out—Avo he looks just like Rosie—but he does not speak. Nothing on Reaver's face moves at all but Sparrow can feel something rolling beneath the skin, a search for words, the decision to try and kill her, it could be either of those things or even neither. She has hit something though, that much Sparrow knows.

Reaver tugs at the cuff of his glove as he finally speaks. "If Her Majesty would please return me to her little school? I have business to attend in Bloodstone; I should gather my things and be on my way."

Sparrow says nothing; she brushes her fingers against the sleeve of his shirt to blink them back to Brightwall but draws her hand quickly back the second they've arrived. Reaver doesn't look at her, he simply moves past her, down the corridor Logan and his friends traveled only minutes beforehand. She watches him go and can't stop herself from seeing her son in each step.

It doesn't hurt—the hollowness that gnaws inside of her chest as she stares after him—not exactly. Sparrow doesn't want to drive him off, in fact, she wants him to stay. She has always wanted him to stay and there's a certain amount of peace in accepting that. But she has built too much upon keeping what she and Reaver share separate from everything else, including the children that he gave her.

And that is the worst thing; she doesn't know if she is right in her defense this time. These things that he's done as of late, the pistol, the pony, and now taking an interest in Logan's ability to protect himself, all of them might add up to the most unselfish Reaver has been since before he sacrificed Oakvale on the Shadow Court's alter.

But there is no leeway for Sparrow to give. How she feels does not matter. Logan, Rosie, and the realm matter—they are all that will ever matter and to keep them safe _Reaver must not be trusted_.

**7.**

The spring following Logan's seventeenth birthday is a bloody one. A group of pirates called the Ravenscar Raiders have banned together to establish a formidable armada. Deciding that they want the south of Albion as their own, the Ravenscar Raiders raze much of the southern coast as Sparrow rushes to gather her troops. Among that which is lost is Bloodstone, and it is the reason that Reaver and she resume speaking.

He was in Bowerstone, overseeing factory construction when the raiders struck. They either knew this or were very lucky in choosing their first target; had Reaver been in his oldest haunt, Sparrow sincerely doubts that they would have gotten a step farther.

Alas, he was not in Bloodstone when she fell and after it, the Ravenscar Raiders have almost twenty-five ships as well a slew of new sailors under their flag. Reaver breaks over two months' worth of cold silence to join her war council. As with Lucien, they have a common enemy to obliterate.

"They're drawing us out," Solomon Turner says after a particularly vexing battle. They had won of course, but things had gotten dicey after a chase and ambush. All that had saved the Crown Forces was having a Hero Queen and Hero-scoundrel ally (sort of) to decimate the opposition.

Her general is looking grimmer than even he usually does. "The bastards want to break the line and get to Bowerstone. I guarantee it, Majesty."

Trained by years of leading, Sparrow makes no outward reaction to Turner's words other than a slight frown as she looks over the map table. Inside however, she is shuddering. She sent Rosie to stay in Brightwall with Logan along with Walter and half of her elite personal guard. Marcella though, is still in the capital with the rest of the guard as well as the standing army. Her wife is a political genius but she's no military leader, the fall of Bowerstone would be a devastating blow, one that Albion might not recover from. Even more importantly, it might embolden the raiders to strike the Crown more personally and Brightwall isn't too awfully far from the sea.

She will burn the crown and run before she lets any harm come to her children.

"How do we engage them, then?" Swift asks the question Sparrow is thinking herself. Her lanky captain crosses his arms, pipe twitching between his teeth as he leans against the wall. "They're skirting about, trying to cajole us into nipping after them so they can pick us off. Meanwhile, while we sit here, they're still bungling up the villages on the coast."

"Not to mention that trade is at an impasse while we've locked up all the sea routes," Admiral Octavia Dart, the only other woman present, adds.

"I'm hearing problems, not solutions," Sparrow says, continuing to frown at the map. She isn't often terse with her people but she isn't often on edge like this.

"I might have something, if Her Majesty would care to hear my proposal."

While Reaver did join her without prodding, their interaction has been marginal. They yell to one another during fights and exchange civilities, but other than that, there is nothing. This is the first time he has offered anything in a meeting.

She raises her eyes to where he leans against the wall across the room, away from the cluster of the rest of the council. To others his face would read as impish, with his smirk and ever-twinkling eyes. Sparrow knows better though, this is his blankest face and best mask.

She has missed the consistency of it.

"I'll hear anything so long as it comes with a possible course of action," she tells him. Straightening up she nods to him. "Speak your mind, Lord Reaver."

To Sparrow's surprise, he doesn't waste time with a joke. Stepping forward Reaver joins the rest of their group at the map table. One gloved finger traces the quickest route between Bowerstone's harbor and Ravenscar Island. His eyes do not shift away from her own.

"As General Turner so cleverly deduced, they're thinning the herd to get to the prize. So to speak," he says with a nod to Solomon. Her general does not nod back, not that Reaver minds. "And Admiral Dart and Captain Swift have the right assumption about what will happen should we continue with this blockade. I daresay that we require something sharper than a wall to slice through a battering ram, Your Majesty."

While she likes the spark in his eye, Sparrow gives nothing away to Reaver. She simply raises an eyebrow and asks, "And what, pray tell, did you have in mind for slicing?"

Somehow, the smile he flashes now seems almost genuine. He taps the map again on Ravenscar Island. "We take their center first."

"And how the bloody hell do you propose we do that?" Dart demands. Her tan, sea-weathered complexion gets all blotchy when she's frustrated. "We have the superior number of ships but not by an overwhelming margin. A head on charge would be a disaster."

"Indeed," Turner agrees. "The second that we move, Bowerstone—the seat of power—is laid bare."

"Perhaps we should allow Lord Reaver to elaborate on his plan," she says, damping the fuses that her people have lit for the other Hero. To Reaver she tilts her head; silent affirmation that she is just as unconvinced as Solomon, Dart, and (probably) Swift.

Reaver nods, unruffled. "Thank you, My Queen. Now, I have small clipper, she's the fastest thing on the seas. Myself and a crew of twenty could man her and slip along the outside of raider lines," he traces around the red arrows that mark their opponents' known territory. "We sail to Ravenscar Island and I lead a Hero's charge to take the rock. All the while, our friends remain distracted by the main fleet and Bowerstone has her barricade."

Sparrow crosses her arms. "You're assuming that taking the island will daunt them."

It's a test, Reaver knows as much and his answer does not fail. "Though they may be made up of ruffians and salt-whores, Majesty, they _are_ an empire. A tiny, dirty, empire. Make no mistake, if their bastion is taken and their emperor beheaded, it will crumble to dust."

"And why exactly should you be the one leading the onslaught?" Dart asks, a single silver-blonde brow raised high. "You're nothing more than a civilian volunteer."

If Sparrow were not in the room, she does not doubt that Reaver would answer the admiral's snide questioning with the roar and spit of his Dragonstomper. Since she is there, he smiles; it's sharper and more deadly than a shark's.

"Ah, but I am a very lethal volunteer, my dear admiral." _And you should remember it_.

Sparrow hedges in before Dart pushes the wrong button too hard. Taking a step back from the map table she folds her hands at the small of her back. While she isn't too terribly tall (or terribly short either), Marcella and Jasper have both assured her that when she imagines her back as a ramrod, she has a way of occupying a space much larger than what she normally might. The "Queen's Stance" they call it, paired with her most regal stare it does the job of drawing every eye to her at this moment.

"Lord Reaver's plan is the only one we seem to have at the moment," she says, cool, calm, and blunt. "Our choices are limited and time limits them further. If present council cannot think of something better, then I shall proceed to move forward."

Dart's face stays mottled; she opts for silence though. Swift isn't exactly at ease, his eyes scurry rapidly between her and Reaver, but he's sensible enough to remain silent, recognizing the only option left to them. Only Turner has any air of calm to him; well, out of the normal people in the room that is.

She nods. "Good. Swift?"

Her man steps forward with a not too formal salute. "Majesty."

"Lord Reaver said that a force of twenty could take Ravenscar along with him; find eighteen of your best, you and I will be the final two."

An eyebrow is raised but Swift does not question her order. Turner appears as if he wants to but he's far too used to her rushing ahead of the cavalry to even attempt such nonsense and Admiral Dart's surprise alone prevents her from speaking up. Reaver, as per the usual, does not follow the rule or good sense.

There are no odd little ticks to Reaver's stance, no change in anything on his face, yet Sparrow feels his displeasure for the modifications to his plan all the same. "Your Majesty's hands-on approach to solving Albion's problems is, as always, refreshing and commendable—"

Why he's protesting, she cannot say. Perhaps Reaver wishes to unleash carnage on the destroyers of his port city, to torture them in ways that she won't allow. Perhaps he's convinced that there is treasure in it for him. Perhaps he plans betrayal. Sparrow does not care; as always trust is something she will never lay in his hands—though she will use him to her advantage so long as she can.

One hand waves off his gilded remonstration. "I am glad you find yourself refreshed and I thank the commendation. The speedy little ship in question is docked closer to Bowerstone, yes? We should take your galleon to it. We'll meet you aboard it in two hours." Without looking to him or anyone else in the room, Sparrow makes her way to the door. "Turner, Dart, keep the barricade strong and the game of cat and mouse up. With any luck this won't be suicide."

Her words are blithe enough but Sparrow isn't a fool. Not a complete one anyway. Her time in her cabin, aside from gathering her weapons and gear, is spent writing letters to her children that she seals and gives to Turner for safe keeping. Just in case.

#

The _Brandywine_ is harbored in the Narrow Bay, between Westcliffe and Bowerstone. For something owned by Reaver it is surprisingly unostentatious. Make no mistake, the ship is well kept and of a clearly superior make but it lacks the showiness—ornate carvings, bright sails, and gilt-covered _everything_—of his flagship. She might compare it to Reaver himself without all of the trappings and pomposity he touts before the public. That would be silly though, everyone is "public" to Reaver.

Still, he's a bit more subdued than usual as they make their way to Ravenscar Island. His swagger, as he shouts orders to the crew—her men are his while they sail—is contained, precise. Reaver shows confidence and control, and somehow, even though they aren't speaking aside from strategy, Sparrow is comforted by the presence that he commands. Especially as the dread pooling in her belly intensifies with every league they draw closer to their destination.

The journey to Ravenscar takes roughly five days. They plan to anchor the _Brandywine _on the eastern side of Blot Island, a rocky little formation just off the northern coast. From there they'll sweep in under the cover of darkness, and pick their way to the keep where the head-runner of this little rebellion, one Lillian Lion-Bane, has set up shop. It's dicey ploy but the best one that they have to choose from, unfortunately.

"If I didn't know better, I might say that Her Majesty looks nervous."

Standing alone on the quarter deck, Sparrow had been focused on the southeast. In the midnight light, the barest outline of Blot Island and beyond it Ravenscar, can be made out against the horizon.

Turning toward the sound of his voice, she can't say what surprises her more; that he's deigned to approach her or that he's left the helm. Reaver has been very tetchy about the helm of his ship. Whatever the reason, she is grateful; even arguing is better than the silence of her own mind.

Sparrow offers him the closest thing to a smile that her anxious mind can muster at this moment. "Not all of us are immortal. Most poor sods are rather breakable."

He laughs at that. "Your troops, perhaps. But you? After everything that you've survived already? I highly doubt that this will break _you_."

"Really now?" she chuckles.

"Really." The edge of his mouth quirks into something familiar and almost sincere. "After all, you've been evading the foul machinations of far better pirates since before the bulk of these vermin were in nappies."

"I wouldn't say _evaded_," Sparrow tells him. She bites her lip in a half-hearted attempt _not_ to say the rest. "Two pregnancies might point to the pirate catching up once or twice."

She expects Reaver to laugh and waggle his eyebrows. At the very least, he will smirk at her and offer to mimic the dance that made her belly swell so many (well perhaps not _that_ many) years before. Sparrow is wholly unprepared for him to reach out and dip just into the collar of her shirt, running a finger along the white gold chain from which Lady Martin's ring hangs; she's rarely taken it off since she carried her son.

"Three," he reminds her quietly.

It isn't as if Sparrow has tried to forget the miscarriage. The event was unfortunate but with a civil war going on at the time, mourning for an unplanned, really quite formless infant had seemed pointless. For Reaver to remember something that they have not openly discussed—_even once_—is surprising, at the very least.

The finger on the chain slides up her neck, tracing a line of muscle under her chin before it curls beneath it with his thumb. That shadow is passing through his eyes again, the one that frightens her more than anything in the world. Logic always reminds Sparrow that Reaver cannot be trusted and she has never left it by the wayside. When these echoes of humanity slip through the cracks however, she finds herself wishing that she could forget her sense.

In some ways she does. He weakens her like that. Veiled behind the mizzen from the rest of the crew, Sparrow shuts her eyes and leans into Reaver, resting her forehead against his collar. In turn, he molds a hand to the back of her neck, thumb rubbing gentle circles against the column of her throat.

Sparrow is tired; so very, very, _very _tired. She wishes she were not queen and her life was her own. She wishes that she did not have to turn away Reaver's interest in her children. She wishes that the hidden moments like this, the few and far between pieces of almost-happiness that she snatches with him, did not have to be hidden at all.

Never, not even once, does Sparrow wish that Reaver had not come into her life.

The spell is broken by one of the men stationed above announcing that their landing is in sight. Sparrow pulls back from Reaver's chest and the spicy perfume of him that even the strong salt air cannot cover. Before she moves out of reach, he kisses her, hard and fast. She feels the hammer of Hero blood pulsing between them, itching for battle as Heroes are meant to.

"Let's obliterate these pests, shall we?" he murmurs against her lips.

"Let's," she agrees. On impulse, Sparrow nips the corner of his mouth before jumping back. She unsheathes her axe, testing the still-perfect heft of it. "Care to make a wager on who might squash more of them?"

Reaver smirks as he twirls his Dragonstomper. "I won't be squashing _anything_. That's for common brutes. Now, might I wager that my death toll shall be higher than Your Majesty's? Of course."

Sparrow laughs. "_That's_ what you said when we were fleeing Lucien's men in the tunnels."

"You used magic," he says as they make their way to the helm. Reaver shoos the man he left there, taking the wheel back with confidence and a grin. "Magic is cheating."

"Humph." She rests her axe across her shoulders. "I do love how magic is cheating but shooting _every_ powder keg is perfectly above board."

"Well, what did you think they were there for?" he asks without looking away from his work. "Besides, even if it were cheating wouldn't that just be expected of me?"

Well, when he has a point…

It's strange, Sparrow thinks, that stamping out a rebellion is their way of making up. Or perhaps it isn't strange at all. Perhaps it is just how Heroes must do things.

No, Hero blood has very little, if anything, to do with the way that they tear enemies apart and then sneak off to fuck with the blood still ruby-red-warm on their hands. It is simply the way that _she and Reaver_ must do things. Sordid and vulgar as it is, Sparrow would not change it.

**8.**

"So you're turning it into a prison?" Reaver asks as he helps himself to the sherry on the edge of Sparrow's desk.

She doesn't look up from the papers in her hand. "I am. You don't approve, I take it?"

Beyond the clink of crystal and splash of liquor being poured, Sparrow can hear him shrugging. Even more loudly, she hears the insincerity of it.

"Oh you know me," he says. "Why let the bullets go to waste? It's so much cheaper to toss garbage into the see than it is to toss coins _at_ the garbage and hopes it transmutes into something less foul."

She grins despite herself. "Well, you don't have magic now, do you?"

He snorts. The bottoms of Reaver's boots come into sight just under the bottom of her papers as he comes to perch on the edge of the divan that she's lounging on. "_You_ don't have that kind of magic either."

A smirk curls her lips; one that Sparrow reckons is a fine match for what Reaver wears himself. These last three months since the Ravenscar Rebellion was crushed have been good, both for Albion and for this…_thing_ between Reaver and her. His presence at the castle has been fairly constant, enough so that she knows that there are probably whispers amongst her court.

She cannot bring herself to care however. Chalk it up to old age (whether it shows or not) or maybe even the fight with the raiders, but she's had her own little spark of rebellion since cleaving off Lillian Lion-Bane's head. Too much of her life has been spent living for things that were not herself; vengeance, duty, the wellness of her kingdom. Reaver is an untrustworthy menace but he is a trustworthy menace that she knows and that can make her laugh. After all of the blood she has poured into the crown, she deserves at least that.

"We'll see," she says, finally setting aside her papers and meeting Reaver's gaze. His head slants to the right, eyes drifting down the line of her neck and into her cleavage without subtlety. It's still quite warm for autumn, so Sparrow is wearing one of her lighter ensembles, which includes a low cut silk bodice and thin linen blouse that she's left mostly unbuttoned. Comfortable, alluring, and also a lovely distraction that allows Sparrow to pluck the sherry out of Reaver's hand.

He scowls as she downs the entire glass. It doesn't upset him enough to move away though. On the contrary, he leans closer and slips his hand into her hair. Warmth floods Sparrow that has very little to do with the soft breeze wafting through the open windows.

Reaver tugs at the clasp that keeps her hair back. It pops beneath his glove and a curtain of black tumbles between them. She can't help but shiver as his fingers rake through and push it away from her face. "How inhospitable, Your Majesty."

"Am I?" she asks, setting the glass aside in favor of straddling his lap.

Sparrow's bodice is mostly undone and her skirts are pushed up past her thigh when the first eerie pulse of alarm strikes her. Through the boiling heat rushing through her as Reaver devours her pulse point and slides a hand into her smallclothes, ice fills her belly. She stops pushing off his jacket to look around the room; nothing _seems_ to be amiss.

And then Reaver stops and she knows that something is amiss. There is almost no power on earth that can dissuade Reaver from sex, even when he isn't hard and about to hilt. They look at each other just as the world flashes white and they are jerked apart.

That tug comes and Sparrow knows what is happening at once. It's been over forty years but the raw, bone-deep, almost-ache that comes from the Tattered Spire is not something she will ever forget.

They land inelegantly and apart in the cold alter-room that she killed Lucien in while he sought to rip the power out of Reaver, Hammer, and Garth. Appropriately, Theresa stands where her sister's murderer once did, at the center rune, hands folded placidly at her waist.

While it might be argued that Sparrow owes Theresa her life it can also be argued that she is the cause of nearly every stitch of misery that she has endured since she was eight years old. She has never forgotten just who urged Rose to start collecting coins for that damned music box. The Seer has always known too much, pulled strings too carefully for anything but suspicious cooperation to exist between them. Theresa is not an enemy she is far, far worse; she is unknown.

Reaver does not care for the Seer either. Not that he can really care for anyone, but it says something, Sparrow thinks, when he pulls himself up and offers her a hand as well. More than that, he pushes her behind him. More than likely it's to keep her out of his way; his pistol has already been drawn and is leveled at Theresa.

She decides not to urge him to lower it. In fact, Sparrow rather wishes that she had something aside from her Will on hand as well. A dagger at the very least would be nice. Being tucked away in a castle most of the time has made her complacent, it seems.

"What is this?" Reaver demands. His arm is steady though Sparrow can _feel_ the itch in the finger that hovers of the trigger.

Theresa does not seem bothered by the firearm directed at her vital bits; not that she has ever seemed…_anything_. Ignoring Reaver completely, she settles her sightless, glowing stare entirely upon Sparrow.

"Murgo's gift, the little Spire, it remains untouched." Forty-odd years and her voice is still as detached as the void itself. It also still sends chills up Sparrow's spine. "Why have you not used it?"

Sparrow knows what the other woman is talking about. Not long after Lucien's death, the trader had delivered a tiny replica of the Spire along with a note to her that promised if she only held it close and pressed her eyes shut, a vision of the future would be hers. As far as she knows, it is still in the cellar of her home in Old Town—where she threw it—if only covered in nearly half a century's worth of grime.

Squaring her shoulders, Sparrow glares back into those preternatural eyes. "The future comes quick enough, thanks. I'm not that interested in seeing what it will dump in my lap too early. Takes all of the fun out of it."

Theresa ignores her snark. "Time is running out, preparations must be made."

The chill of dread seeps back into Sparrow's stomach and it takes every fiber of her will not to shiver; she refuses to give Theresa the satisfaction. She refuses to a lot actually.

She has fought, and fought, and fought since she was eight-years-old. To survive, to avenge her sister, to run a blasted country. Sparrow aches in her bones in a way completely unrelated to physical woes; she is _tired_ and she demands her rest.

With her hands balled into her skirts so she won't give into the urge to spell-cast, Sparrow says, "Then conjure-up Garth and Hammer to this blasted place," She feels heat building beneath her palms, her Will might burst forth in fire at any second no matter how tight a fist she clenches.

She swallows but puts out her chin. "I did more than my part; call on the runaways to pull their weight for once."

Theresa's serenity remains unbroken. "It is not within Hammer and Garth's capabilities to do what must be done."

"Well, then I guess whatever it is won't be done."

"It is not for you to do either, Little Sparrow." Her gut rolls at the nickname; Rose was the last person to call her by that with love and Theresa spoils it just as she has so much already.

"I think you should return us," Reaver breaks through gritted teeth. Sparrow looks at him; his expression is icy and dangerous. She has seen his petty aggravation plenty of times but true rage? It is rarer and somehow more human than when he smiles and seems with genuine amusement.

Theresa, of course, does not heed him. "Do not worry, Reaver, it is not your destiny either. You have played the part necessary of you."

Sparrow's insides lurch with those words. Not Hammer. Not Garth. Not her. Not even Reaver. There are only two others that Sparrow can think of that have Hero blood. Two others that Reaver has played at least some part with.

She stops holding back her Will, lets the power flow outward into wings and lines, burning the air around her. With a ball of lightning is clenched in her fist she pushes past Reaver.

"No." That word would have toppled anyone else standing before Sparrow. Theresa however, does not so much as sway.

The Seer spreads her arms wide, bringing forth a vision of a grand globe. "It is the world that hangs in the balance this time, not just Albion. Darkness is coming."

"I don't care." Sparrow means it. For Logan and Rosie, she would see her kingdom crumble. Albion will be ash and rubble before she willingly subjects her children to a taste of the tragedies that come with Archon blood. "Find someone else."

"There is no one else," Theresa says. "Your—"

"_No_!" A wave of blue flames gush from Sparrow's hands, though it is nothing compared to the white-hot rage bubbling in her chest. Theresa holds up her hands, willing the inferno to part. She succeeds but only just, staggering back several yards. Her face is unchanged but Sparrow can read disbelief on even that unchanging face.

"My children will not be your pawns!" She sends another flare to knock Theresa backward. "Set yourself on fire and be the fucking torch for humanity if you want to save us!"

She's about to do it herself. The power pulsing through Sparrow's veins feels potent enough to melt the Spire down into the sea. And she will do it. She will send this wretched place and Theresa to the Void even if it kills her.

And then there is a trickle of blue light and a man stands between she and the Seer.

At least Sparrow _thinks_ that it's a man. Perhaps the term she's looking for is "used to be" because she can scarcely look at him/it and believe that there is life under that weathered façade.

A shell of taut, discolored skin is stretched gruesomely over tall bones and swathed in gold armor, blue silk, and white fur; the design of which seems to be as ancient as the figure itself. Blue war paint—or are they Will lines?—covers the wrinkled flesh of its face. Two sunken reddish points sit where the eyes would be. In his hand, there is a great curved blade, taller than the body that holds it.

This is power that stands before her, Sparrow knows it. Raw, ancient power and for just a second she is frightened enough of it to stop her assault. The "eyes" look her over before the whole gaunt frame twists toward Theresa.

"So, Granddaughter," his voice is deep, echoing like he stands at the bottom of a deep well. Unexpected from a husk; Sparrow believed dust would come from that frightening maw. "The mess you've made is not so neat, is it?"

If Sparrow weren't ready to vibrate out of her skin with fear and rage, she might take pleasure in how Theresa _finally _looks ruffled. "It is no concern of yours, Old One. Return to your Spire and leave me mine."

"Everything is of concern to me, girl," he says. Sparrow is unprepared for those red eyes to shift to her and how fast that those old bones turn; she very nearly back peddles. Beneath that ancient gaze, Sparrow has never felt so insignificant. "Ah, you saw to it that the bird returned home to nest. Poor thing."

The demand of "What do you mean?" rises in Sparrow's throat but does not quite make it up to her tongue. A familiar hand has her wrist and is yanking her backward. She lets Reaver do it, if only because he is the only thing familiar in this ever more-frightening confrontation. A second pistol, too small to be a Dragonstomper, is out and directed toward Theresa's so-called Old One, as soon as he's nudged her behind him.

Well, if she weren't worried already.

"Return us to Bowerstone," Reaver commands somehow eyeing both of their companions at the same time. "_Now_."

Theresa says nothing while the Old One stares for a moment and then laughs. He laughs even harder when Reaver shoots; he isn't even jarred from the spot. Sparrow feels lightheaded.

"Briar's line," the Old One chuckles, cocking his head at Reaver. "Pure Skill. Graceful but ultimately weak."

That's all the warning given before a pure tide of Force whips from a gold gauntlet. Sparrow dives one way and Reaver another, though she does not leap quite fast enough. The tail of the blast catches her and Sparrow is thrown across the wide, polished black floor, stopping when the left side of her connects with the wall. Her head takes the brunt of the impact though her shoulder and ribs certainly aren't given a soft landing.

Shots ding just above the ringing in Sparrow's ears. Copper floods her mouth, a devious partner to the sharp pain radiating from her temple, as she scrabbles to stand and stop time. Her attempt is negated by the Old One, he stands above her in a blink, weapon raised.

He does not laugh as he brings the gilded butt of his scythe down to her forehead and says, "She locked the door on you, Little Bird. She broke the mirror so you couldn't look back. Let me help you."

Sparrow doesn't have a chance to protest. The scythe comes down and the world flashes white and she is lost in the blaze.

_In another lifetime, under a different name, she looked for Robin at the crossroads at midnight. The same crossroads where he had told her that the blind fortune teller read him his cards. He had turned from her and there had been madness clouding his clear blue eyes as he left the town square._

_When she finally found him, he was running through the fields back to Oakvale, as if there were bandits on his tail. Scared as she was to see that, she was also elated. There had been a real and true fear gnawing and gnashing at her bones, one that said he would not return to her, that he was a lost cause. It was far too late by the time that she realized that she had indeed lost him; that he had already drowned in Shadows._

_At the sounds of their home being rent apart, __**she**__ had turned her back on __**him**__, trying to save those that she could. She could not even save herself. Her axe had not been bright enough to cut the darkness and she fell with a hole in her chest. He held her as it consumed her, begging her to stay and whimpering apologies. In the end, she could not bear to look at him. It was easier to fade than it was to see that the Shadows were now inside of him. He was no longer Robin and what was left of her half-eaten heart broke with her last breath._

Sparrow returns to herself with a gasp. Still lying on the floor where she'd fallen, there are only two differences. The Old One no longer stands over her, he stands back from her, watching but not hovering. The second thing is the wall of blue light that bisects the room. Reaver along with Theresa is on the opposite side, and he's shooting at it madly, as if that might have any effect.

He stops when he notices her sitting up.

Blue eyes meet her own. They aren't clear; they have not been for a long time. Her chest aches with memories she had forgotten, another lifetime she wished had stayed closed. It was kind of Theresa to lock that door and break that mirror, even if it wasn't strictly intended to be a kindness.

"Robin." She says the name, wanting it to be a lie.

He flinches. She has never seen him flinch. That, more than the vision, is what damns him.

"Come." the Old One extends a golden hand to her, his tone is almost kind. "We will do what we can in the time we have, Little Bird."

She does not look back; she takes the gauntlet proffered and lets the Old One draw her up and into his side.

"Sparrow!"

She has never turned from Reaver when he said her name. She takes no joy in it.

"_Oriole_!"

She didn't expect him to say it. Didn't expect him to have the audacity to. She hates him for it, though not nearly as much as she hates herself. Her tears feel like poison as they scald tracks down her cheeks. Something inside of her is crumbling beneath Reaver's shadowed blue eyes, something that she never believed that she'd given him.

Grabbing the chain, she rips Lady Elmira's ring from around her neck, ignoring the sting of breaking skin. With all of her might, Sparrow throws the ring at the wall. It bounces off the spot in front of Reaver's face. He almost looks surprised.

"You did this!" she screams as the Old One pulls her back. "You bastard, you helped her! You handed her our children!"

And as she's whisked away in a flash of blue light, Sparrow wants to believe that Reaver flinches again. But that would be foolish which, she must admit, is not at all an unfair description of her. She trusted Reaver, perhaps not consciously, but even that little bit seems it might be enough to ruin the future for her children.

* * *

**Author's Notes:** Things to be clear about:

—Yes, the "Old One" would be Scythe/William Black.

—According to _Fable: The Journey_ and some extended world stuff, Theresa is very much not a person to be trusted. She's the reason that the Corruption and its chief lieutenant the Crawler were released. That combined with her "ends justify the means attitude"—let's not bat around it, she sent Rose to die so Sparrow would be driven to fight Lucien—make her more than spotty in character. At best, she's True Neutral and inarguably suspicious.

—Sparrow did not have a vision of someone else's life. She was the "Her" (Oriole, in this little universe) mentioned in Reaver's diary during the second game. There will be more on this not-at-all coincidental reincarnation in the following chapters.

This is the final chapter from Sparrow's POV, the last two are going to belong to our favorite actual piece of human filth, you guessed it, _Reaver_. That said, I'm sorry that this took so long but I had a lot to cover and even more to edit.

Also, the fancy new story art was made by the wonderful helila. There is a link to her tumblr and commissions page on my profile. If you're looking for a super talented and reliable artist for one of your own projects I highly recommend her. Or you could just drop on by and tell her how much you like her artwork, she would love that too, I'm sure.

Hope you enjoyed this chapter!

XOXO

—Celeste


	5. And I'd Do Anything

****Disclaimer:**** I do not own the Fable franchise.

* * *

**1.**

Once upon a time, there was a little Robin. He was hatched in a small town that overlooked the sea. It was a bustling, lively, and prosperous place, this town, and it was special because it was one of the only places left in the world where Heroes were still born. The little Robin was himself from Hero stock, though that does not yet matter in this tale.

From the moment that he came into the world, the little Robin was loved and adored. His parents had lost three nestlings before they had even been hatched you see, so they'd long given up hope that they would finally have a chick of their very own. To them, Little Robin was a treasure, nay a miracle, and they always treated him as such. It spoiled him a bit but there were two people who could always make Little Robin remember himself.

The first was his grandfather. A stern but not unkind man, Little Robin's grandfather was a great sailor. He oversaw fleets of merchant ships across the sparkling blue bay, ushering wealth and prosperity into the town. Grandfather was a pillar of the community, well-liked and respected and he was determined to make Little Robin just as prized.

The other was another bird born with the blood of Heroes, a lovely Oriole with hair the color of the night and brown eyes that were as warm as the midday sunshine. Little Robin was smitten with this Oriole from the moment they met—which was too young for him to actually recall with any precision. She belonged to him though, he was sure, and he never doubted that she felt the same way. They were true birds of a feather, destined to fly high, sing, and nest for all their lives.

As it always goes with these stories, so much that should have been did not come to be. Elsewise, you might think that there was no point to this story at all.

Little Robin's parents sailed the seas frequently. His mother, Grandfather's only daughter, was his second-in-command and as Grandfather got older it was she more oft than not, who lead their ships across the waves, with her husband aboard serving as her first mate. When Little Robin was not yet twelve, his parents departed for what was to be a quick run to a northern port. They would be back, they promised, with many presents.

They did not keep that promise, they could not. Little Robin's mother and father did not even make it out of sight of their town. A storm rose, almost like magic, out on the sea, tossing and turning their ship and as she struggled to stay afloat, slimy, black-green arms rose from the choppy depths to tear her apart. All of this Little Robin watched, horrified and helpless, and it was in that terrible moment where he first learned to fear Death.

The next few years were difficult for both Little Robin and Grandfather as they dealt with their loss. They had each other though, and Grandfather was nothing if not a resilient man who had weathered a thousand tempests before this one. And of course, Little Robin had his Oriole to console him.

He became a man in many ways in the years following his parents' deaths, enough so that he wasn't so "little" any longer. Grandfather did not allow either of them to fear the sea, and he taught Robin to love the waves again, as his mother would have wished. Like his mother and grandfather, Robin knew one day that he would take the helm of his own ship and have no fear when he did.

Then, there were other, more delicate, rites to manhood that Robin passed with Oriole's help. Ones that made every inch of him burn when he gazed upon her or heard her laugh or caught the scent of her hair. Small rituals in broom cupboards with soft, warm hands and lips. Quick ones stolen in nearly every darkened alleyway that the town possessed. He was sixteen when she guided him through the most important of all these sacraments beneath the setting sun in a clearing that they claimed as their nest. Robin left it having learned the most important lesson of his life: none but his Oriole would ever make him truly happy.

A lesson, unfortunately, that he did not always remember.

Years upon years of joy came to a cold, abrupt end, when Grandfather took ill. It was a strange illness, striking almost overnight. The great man who had raised Robin wasted away before his eyes, and like with his parents he could do nothing. More than ever Robin feared Death, but now he also feared the years between, the shriveling, the bleeding, and the coughing, but especially the pain. It consumed him and not even Oriole's touch gave Robin solace.

As he wandered one night, consumed by his fears, Robin encountered a strange woman at the crossroads. She was blind, it seemed, and yet she could see, she knew his name, and she gave him three cards, telling him that, in the darkest heart of the forest, if he truly wanted, there would be salvation from Death. Though the price, she warned, would be almost unbearable.

Robin might have forgotten the fortune teller. He meant to, he tossed away her cards and returned to his nest. But things in his nest were troubled. Grandfather had not finished teaching Robin all of his trade and the once prosperous business that his family cultivated was starting to dwindle. In an effort to maintain his territory, Robin turned to less savory means; smuggling.

It might not have been the most terrible thing, had his Oriole not become the sheriff of their town. By pure accident, she caught him and, with a heavy heart, punished him as she would any other. Robin was shamed before his people and the legacy that Grandfather and his mother had so carefully built, was torn to pieces.

Robin could not forgive his Oriole and he abandoned their nest to fly through the woods. Without direction, found that he had wandered into the deepest, darkest part of the forest, where no light could touch and Shadows strangled everything.

The Shadows spoke to Robin, promising him armor from what he feared most. All that they asked for in return was his permission to make his town their own and a visitor every few years. In his rage and weakness, Robin could not resist their bargain.

His regret was immediate. As the Shadows burst forth, dread pooled in Robin's belly and he saw how terrible his mistake was. He tried to call them back but to no avail; the contract had been struck. Flying fast as his wings could carry him, Robin returned home to find everything he had loved crumbling to ash; all of his neighbors, his friends, and even the one person he had never intended to trade.

His Oriole fought the Shadows valiantly, a bright spot in the darkness. But even her light was not strong enough, and she was lost like all of the others. Only she knew what he had done; Oriole saw the Shadows seeping into Robin and his crime. He held her tightly as the life fled her bones but she would not look at him.

With his Oriole gone, what was left of Robin perished as well. Another man formed from the ashes, one who refused regret or shame or anything else that might be seen as human. That man walked alone, only reminded of his crimes when he was weary enough to shut his eyes.

And therein lies the moral of the Robin's tale: beware grasping at the Shadow lest you lose the Substance. For once you have touched the Darkness, it is part of you, and there is no going back.

**2.**

"Got a new arrival," Pike's gravelly voice shears the midmorning silence Reaver had been almost enjoying. He glances at the other man, one of his more reliable informants in Bloodstone. Reliable being a relative term of course. No one in this salty, sea-beaten town can truly be trusted when enough gold is put on the table, most of all Reaver himself. Still, Pike is smart enough to know whose hand to keep following.

In the reflection of his shaving mirror, he sees Pike has remained beyond the threshold of the bedchambers, nothing unusual. Most know that all bets and treaties fall aside once that particular line is crossed. What _is_ unusual is Pike's stance; his arms are crossed and that oily, pockmarked face of his has a twitch to it.

An interesting new arrival then.

Reaver only continues on smiling and shaving. "Do we? A pretty one I hope."

Pike's disquiet becomes ever more visible in the tick of his jaw and the shifting of his feet. "S'the Sparrow."

Reaver drags the razor along his jaw. Well, that makes it a_ very_ interesting new arrival.

Word of Heroes traipsing across Albion has been reaching him for some time now, with one particular wave-maker almost always at the tales' center. The prowess of her do-goodery is so luminous that it has even spread to outliers such as Bloodstone and he knew it would only be a matter of time before she flounced into his city. He's almost been looking forward to it, if nothing else he suspects a fellow Hero would at least put up a jolly fight before he plants a bullet between her eyes.

"And where is this little bird now?" he asks, carefully hedging around the patch of hair he wishes to keep on his chin.

"Set herself up in the inn," Pike tells him. "Listenin' t' Salty Jack's horseshit about Cap'n Dread still sailin' 'round. Also had it out with Toby, sent that idiot runnin'."

"Generous of her," Reaver says. "He was rather useless, wasn't he?" Though still _his_ like every other scrap of filth in this city. Traipsing into town and already changing the status quo? That won't do. Not at all.

Pike doesn't answer the question, knowing well that it wasn't meant to be answered. He does remain steadfastly at the door, waiting for dismissal or direction. Reaver finishes his shave before finally giving him one of those things.

"Find out where she is now," he orders as he cleans the excess lather from his face with a hot towel. "I expect details within the hour. I'll ready myself to greet our visitor."

Pike nods without hesitation. "As y'say, Reaver." And the man takes his leave as expediently has possible without turning his back. Smart man, Pike. Reaver appreciates that if nothing else.

Lucien has been offering rewards for this Sparrow; word came of that over a month ago. While he's rather intrigued by someone with the ability to piss off a man like the not-really-that-good Lord Fairfax and even more intrigued by the idea of reward, turning her over would not be Reaver's first choice. If the old man hasn't managed to keep her in his clutches once, he will most certainly lose her again. And that can spell further annoyances for him down the road.

Killing her is best, Reaver decides as he pulls on his waistcoat and jacket. End the trouble before it can really begin. End _her_ before she can get a better foothold dug in _his_ territory.

He polishes his Dragonstomper while he waits for Pike or one of Pike's various underlings to return with the Sparrow's whereabouts. His pistol has never failed him, and he doubts that it will start today. He weighs the options of where to put the bullet. The skull is always the safest bet but that doesn't seem sporting. Of course, he reasons that her magic, another rumor that has wafted his way, is hardly sporting either, so a headshot evens them out.

It's one of the underlings that returns to him with news. One of the nameless (at least insofar that he is concerned) whores that run the streets. Breathless, fidgety, and very blonde, her ample bosom is heaving when the doorman sends her through to his study. Someone made a sprint today.

"Sh—shore," she pants, clutching at the archway. "Th' Sparrow's goin' up th' shore. Salty Jack done talked her into searchin' for th' '_Marianne_'."

Now, he's almost perturbed. The destruction of the _Marianne_and her dunce of a captain was how he won his crown. Perhaps not his greatest achievement (honestly, Reaver doesn't want to peg his greatest achievement, it makes the future seem so stunted) but it's certainly up there.

Coming into his town, changing the status quo, and now chasing down remnants of one of his most iconic victories. This little Sparrow definitely needs to go. He shoots the messenger as he storms his way upstairs, because he can and why not?

On the house's western side, there is a port that opens onto the roof. Whether it was whim or a precaution that made him put it there, Reaver doesn't quite remember nor does he care. All that matters is it is there for him to pop out of and take stock of the shore.

Hero sight on its own is incredible and among Heroes, the limited amount that he's encountered, Reaver's gaze is unparalleled. He can zero-in on objects that are miles and miles away from him. Scanning the shore from the highest point in all of Bloodstone there is no way for the stranger making her way up his beach to the coves to hide from him.

About an instant after he finds her though, he finds himself wishing that she had managed to dodge his sight.

Long black hair tumbling in waves over strong, squared shoulders, a wicked master axe and rifle holstered on her back. A dog is at her side.

Something in his stomach rolls.

She scratches the dog behind its ear and he _knows _the shape of her arm, the twitch of the muscles as her hand extends, and the strength held in her shoulders.

_There's a spot just below her left shoulder blade that she simultaneously loathes to have touched and yearns to have kissed. Robin has mastered the art of teasing his way around the planes of muscle on her back so that it just about drives her mad._

"_Rob…" She whines and arches beneath him, trying to gain leverage. He gives her none, only leaning up to nose an ebony curl by her ear. It softer than mink and smells like heather._

There is no heart in Reaver's chest, not any more. There is a device of flesh that pumps blood but he wouldn't call it a heart. No, no, that had to be done away with long ago. All of Robin had had to go.

There is something left of that pest however, a wisp, a scrap, a faint flicker. Pure nuisance. It twitches at the sight of the Sparrow with her dog. It all but blows apart when she turns and he can see her face.

Smooth tawny complexion across a finely sculpted oval face. The chin is firm, stubborn, and the nose is straight, settled over a plush mouth and beneath large coffee brown eyes. Every freckle, every divot, every single line is as he remembers. And remember Reaver cannot help but to do.

_Blood dribbles from the corner of her mouth, down her chin, courtesy the gaping hole in her chest. More coats Robin's hands as he lifts her into his arms, trying in vain to stopper the wound._

"_I take it back," Robin sobs. "I take it all back. I don't want this. I don't. Please don't leave me. Please."_

_All of his pathetic mewling is too late though and she knows it just as well. Tears leak from her dimming eyes and the last of her strength is spent turning her head from the sight of him._

_That face_. He knows that face; it has haunted his dreams for going on two-hundred years. How dare this stranger come to his city with _her _face.

Even as one voice in his head denies, another rejoices.

The lingering wisp that once was Robin echoes through Reaver like dry bones jangling in a clay pot. The laughter of the should-be-dead is a grating thing.

_She came back_.

No. She did not. _She_ is dead. Buried and long gone.

As hard as Reaver denies that he knows those shoulders and the sway of the hips connected to them however, he cannot deny her face.

All of the disbelief in him boils to anger in a snap.

This Sparrow came into _his_ city, upset the status quo _he_ has spent so long cultivating, and now she dares to wear _her_ face? Reaver is not a man who takes insults and this is one he will especially not allow. Oh, she has flown to the wrong nest and he will see her pretty wings clipped.

He raises his arm, intending to put so many bullets between her ears that nothing is left of her pretty head. She is in his sights and helpless. His finger curls over the trigger.

And cannot move.

The wisp that remains of Robin has slunk into his wrist.

Not again, it whispers, and much as Reaver tries to shake it, he simply can't bring himself to pull the trigger.

On the beach, the Sparrow pauses, as if she feels his eyes on her. She looks about for a moment, head turning toward his vantage point but stops as the mangy mongrel accompanying her barks and runs past her. Shaking her head, she sprints after the dog that has begun a mad dig around some rocks.

Reaver goes back inside, barricading the doors of his study and pulling every bottle from his liquor cabinet. He can't kill the Sparrow but he can't let her get away with wearing that face either. Reaver tamps down the echoes of the dead man that he carries, burying him deep with drink and an impromptu soiree. Robin remains subdued, at least until Reaver can no longer hold his eyes open. The dreams are worse than they have ever been that night and remain particularly vivid for some time to come.

**3.**

This little venture that the Great Blind Twit has them all going on to the ruins of the Old Guild, is by far the least enjoyable romp that Reaver has taken in over a century. Quite frankly, he reckons that he might take his chances with a Kraken. Lots of dangerous, flailing limbs seems a tad less volatile than being chased down by a madman. A Sea Monster would also be better company than the snorting beast with her great cudgel, the sorcerer, and the damnable birdbrain. Yes, her most of all.

She came back from the Wraithmarsh unscathed. Of course she did. Anything to spite him, whether on purpose or not.

He has to admit though, while Sparrow might have a damn near perfect replication of Oriole's face, it is only near. The eyes are different, and that one thing equates to a whole new world. Yes, the shape, the color, and every crease and every eyelash are as he remembers, but they are also hard. Oriole's eyes were soft and open, she trusted easily. These eyes of Sparrow's are ones that have viewed true hardship, true suffering. Dark things have bombarded her, changed her, and she has endured. Those things have prompted great, spiked shields to rise behind her pupils.

So they are not the same. Be it that copy is similar enough to the memory, in truth or by the erosion of time, or that he simply feels like trying his hand at scaling those spiked armaments, he cannot say. Reaver is simply pulled to Sparrow and he indulges, as he always does, approaching her in the little wayside inn that their hardly-merry troupe has holed up in along the road to Bower Lake.

Watching from the shadows, Reaver waits for the over-muscled buffoon—Hammer, _such_ an appropriate name—to leave. She's supposed to be taking watch tonight, Heroes of Strength apparently don't have much of a need for sleep (so the lout claims). But they do apparently need several flagons of ale to make it to the dawn. She takes her sweet time, rambling at the barkeep and at Sparrow. For a moment or two, he is convinced that the muscle-bound giantess never actually intends to take point. She does eventually leave her overburdened bar stool however, clapping Sparrow on the shoulder as she goes. The other mutt of the four-legged variety tags along after an assenting scratch behind the ear from his mistress.

She would have to be fond of slobbering mongrels too, wouldn't she? At least the one nipping at her heels isn't the size of a horse.

Unbidden, Bear, with his thick, dark, brackish-brown coat and oddly high-pitched bark flashes in Reaver's mind. It comes with a woodsy smell, pinesap and wild lavender from the forests not far beyond the bridge where the creature spent so much time bagging game and frightening off wolves. Such a blighted big dog. Not clumsy though, and smart. He hadn't been afraid of the sea either...

Reaver suppresses a growl that bubbles low in his throat. Bear is heap of bones enfolded in the swamp now, nothing else. No use at all comes from thinking about the fleabag. He focuses instead on the firm line of Sparrow's waist and the bit of neck that her thick braid allows to be seen.

"Abandoned, are you?" he asks, standing rather than sitting with his back braced against the polished oak of the bar. Both as a defense, he likes keeping the door in view, lest Lucien's little soldiers attempt to sneak in, and to keep his eye on Sparrow herself. She is, after all, a tricky one.

She glances over at him with far less anger than he had seen lighting her eyes when she'd kicked the door to his manor open just a few days ago. Wariness—or is it weariness?—has settled in the earthy depths of her irises. Not a word passes her red lips.

"You know the strong and silent type is generally an archetype found to be attractive in men," he says. She takes a drink from her flagon and still says nothing, though Reaver notes a just a touch of amusement curling at the corner of her mouth. Reaver decides that this does not perturb him and presses on.

"I can't say it doesn't work for you though." He makes a show of looking her up and down, pausing on point at the brass buttons that keep her tooled leather bodice closed. Her weapons belts block an otherwise lovely view of her bosom. So unfortunate, foregoing something almost perfect for practicality's sake. "But then, I suppose that there is very little you couldn't make work, is there, _mon petit oiseau_?"

Beneath his lingering smirk, Sparrow's silence finally breaks. "What did you want, Reaver?" He can't read any annoyance in her tone. Actually, he can't read anything in her tone.

He loathes her. Absolutely and entirely. She wasn't supposed to come back from the Shadow Court still wearing that face. Though he had hoped that she would not come back at all.

No, not true. A part of him had hoped she would come back. The same cursed bit that had been thrilled with the first sight of her.

All of him wants her, even the part that wants to wrap his hands around her throat. Since she won't die or take off that face, Reaver supposes that he should make the best of things.

Leaning down, he dips his head next to hers as if they are conspirators in some clever game. Sparrow does not frown, pull back, or slam that ugly looking axe of hers into his vitals, so he takes that as cue to continue. "There's a fair chance that the world could be ending, no?" He holds her gaze steady and licks his lips. "What say we live a bit before facing down annihilation?"

There is a moment as he stares into those rich umber eyes, in which Reaver honestly cannot say whether or not this gambit might be his last. She could kill him. He has seen her yank Time into a crawl; Reaver is the fastest marksman ever to grace the world but even he couldn't react fast enough if that sort of power hit him. He would be helpless against her. And that, somehow, thrills him just as much as the vicious prickle beneath his ribs that wonders if her lips taste like those of ghost whom she dares to impersonate.

Then everything shifts and he sees the same heat simmering just beneath her skin that is under his. Reaver can clearly make out the war waging between her desire and good sense, can hear the voices in her head listing all of the reasons that he cannot be trusted while others demand to test how adroit the Hero of Skill really is.

It's all that he can do not to groan when Sparrow bites down into her lower lip. She must know what she's doing, he absolutely cannot believe otherwise. Damn the earnest naïveté that oozes from her every pore.

"Your room," she finally says, rising from her seat. "Don't talk. Not a word to the others."

For once, Reaver does not test the limits set before him. He smirks and he bows, feigning a gentleman's grace in ushering her ahead, but other than that, he keeps himself together. Until the door closes and the bolt on it slides into place.

In the instant between shutting out the rest of the world and jerking her into a kiss (or perhaps she's jerking him) that troublesome wisp is murmuring in his ear again. Is the space behind her ear as sensitive? Are her hips going to fit his hands as perfectly as Oriole'sdid so long ago? Will it feel the same? Will he be able to bear it?

The answer to all of those queries is both "yes" and "no."

She tastes the same but different too, her tongue is tainted by this new life that Reaver knows next to nothing about. That spot just beneath her earlobe still makes her shudder but she doesn't call his name after he lips it as Oriole once did. All of her fits him, but Sparrow is a stranger in his arms, fierce, wild, and hard. Robin never touched Oriole and Oriole never touched Robin with such fire and demand. Those phantoms never fought and this with Sparrow, this is surely a battle if he has ever been in one, evidenced by the multiple nail-furrows, teeth-marks, and bruises they leave one another with.

Underneath it all however, the most familiar thing has remained: the thrum of Hero's blood. Screeching, searching, the primal pulse within him demands return from her and vice versa. Two-hundred years he has spent burying the memory of this dance and returning to the steps all but drives him mad.

Their vicious coupling lasts long into the night, leaving him sapped and sated. Highly unusual for him, but then Reaver hasn't shared his bed with another Hero in ages. He expects, as his consciousness flags, that sleep tonight will be even more difficult. The past he drowned has been stirring since she showed up in his harbor; he feels it ready to swallow him up as soon as his eyelids close.

But there are no nightmares this night; in fact, there are no dreams at all. Reaver falls asleep watching the rise and fall of Sparrow's chest and that is all that occupies the soft whispers in his head. Robin has, for the moment, been silenced.

The once tightly packed dirt above Robin's grave however, has begun to stir; Reaver feels the gravel rattle in his bones. Which makes an impromptu trip to Samarkand all the more appealing once the opportunity arises.

Back he comes eventually though. The Shadow Court calls. As does a ghost who has somehow managed to take flesh.

**4.**

While he was away in Samarkand, Sparrow had busied herself with cementing quite the share of wealth in Albion, which included buying up almost every stitch of available property. Reaver's own mansion in Bloodstone was one of the very few tracts of land that she didn't acquire. One would think that having the lion's share of wealth and land in a country would just automatically make a body the sovereign of the place. That's how it works on the sea, and aside from the occasional Kraken to run from, Reaver hasn't had much problem defending his crown.

The land works differently though and Sparrow can't deny the call to unite Albion. Reaver backs her decision from the shadows with gold in the right places and a few other sordid things he keeps from her. Paving the way for a ruler who he's in bed with is just business sense. And maybe it would fulfill a fantasy or two of fucking on a throne. Either or, it's a win for him.

Reaver doesn't accompany her on the formal campaign. There's his personal work and the string pulling that he does for her to occupy him while Sparrow is out playing at Conquering Hero. He has plenty of eyes kept on her though; must protect the investment, of course. He never actually expects to hear from any of his agents saying that something has happened to her.

Dropping everything to go straight to her camp is just part of looking after the investment, nothing more. Though, that "investment" might surely throw a fireball at him if kills any of her precious subordinates. A small oversight that he's not thinking so keenly of when, upon his arrival in Sparrow's camp, a whelp blocks his path and demands to know what he's doing there.

The Dragon Stomper is out in a blink shooting the sword from the idiot's hands. While the idiot in question jumps back cursing, a few others scrabble for their weapons. Reaver sighs and prepares to murder half of Sparrow's personal vanguard.

He's going to have to buy her an entire bloody armada for her to let this go.

The cadre of idiots are saved however, by the appearance of another whelp.

"Stop it!" he shouts with more command than a scrawny, teenage boy dandied-up in the middle of a war camp should. Reaver almost respects it. "That is enough; her ladyship is resting and doesn't need this ruckus!" He rounds on the boy who stood in Reaver's path, smacking his shoulder. "Walter, you brute! What are you even doing?"

"What business has _he—_" a gruff gesture comes Reaver's way, "—got here?"

The smaller boy slaps him again. Jasper, he thinks that might be his name. One of Sparrow's foundlings. Reaver really does enjoy the pluck in him. "You _know_ why he is here. Now try and be discreet for once in your life and calm the rest of this lot down. _Idiot_." And another smack goes to Walter's arm before Jasper turns, adjusting his coat as he bows to Reaver. "Lord Reaver, I do apologize on Walter's behalf. It has been a very long day."

As much as Reaver does like tipping his hat to good sense, he's not in the mood. "Where is she?" he demands, holstering his pistol but keeping his palm on the handle.

Jasper, proving to be a paragon of good sense, doesn't bat an eyelash. "Her tent is this way, my lord. If you would please follow me." And as if they were in Sparrow's manse, Jasper begins a brisk trot, swatting soldiers out of the way like dust mites.

He could have found her tent without Jasper, it's the largest by far and surrounded by several guards.

"What was that commotion about?" the inquiry comes from a mousy young woman who wears the white and green kit of a physician. She is sitting in a chair not far removed from cot where Sparrow lays.

Something in Reaver's ribs twitches at the sight of the other Hero incapacitated. He seen her fall before, watched Lucien put a bullet straight between her eyes. That had been different though. She hadn't looked helpless then, even when she was crashing to the ground.

Now she is utterly defenseless, bright pink and covered in a thin veneer of sweat, with breath coming in shallow gasps. Her eyelids flicker but she's not conscious. The strangest urge to brush back the hair clinging to her brow runs through Reaver's fingers. He denies the itch, digging his thumbs into his belt.

"What happened?" he asks the doctor without looking away from Sparrow.

The woman doesn't answer right away. He can feel her shift uncomfortably and glancing toward Jasper who gives his nodding consent. She heeds the younger man, which is fortunate for her because Reaver needs to distract his hands and shooting a fidgety doctor would be the perfect thing.

"She took a hard kick to the belly," Sparrow's physician tells him.

_Now_ he looks at her, and the pure disdain and disbelief that he doesn't hide sends the good doctor backpedaling one or two paces. "A kick? She's a bloody _Hero_. She has had a bullets rattling around with her brain tissue. Are you honestly trying to tell me that she's been reduced to such a state by a mere human putting their foot in her gut?"

The doctor trembles but she doesn't cower. All of these weak little fools and their backbone; it'll get them killed one day. "No, my lord, I am not saying it was a mere human's foot to her gut is what brought her to this. I am saying that a kick caused her to miscarry and _that_ trauma is what has put in this state."

Now it seems that it's his turn to backpedal. Well, not actually but the words do come at him like a slap.

Over the years, Reaver has kept a very close eye on Sparrow. He knows who comes and goes around her and who has shared her bed. Since his return from Samarkand three years ago there has only been one person sleeping with the other Hero and that is him.

The echo of Robin is sick. Reaver strangles it but cannot completely diminish the sharp twinge that's left running through his innards.

He does not love her; he doesn't love _anything_ besides himself. Even then, that's probably a gross stretch of the word. Love conveys a capability that he buried in Oakvale's waterlogged and bloody fields.

Anger can still come to Reaver though and he has never liked the idea of anyone touching his possessions. He can't put Sparrow in a cupboard, but as long as he's interested in fucking her that means that she is _his_. As certainly would be anything that he might have helped her make. Collecting a due for something of his that has been broken is only the most natural of instincts.

"Do not tell her that I was here," he orders Jasper and the little doctor as he turns on the heel of his boot and marches out.

**#**

"You—you'll really let us go?"

Reaver doesn't usually enjoy placing the Dark Seal in anyone's hands. He doesn't hate it, but it isn't exactly something that he relishes. Or he has not before today, when he dragged Lady Martin and her son into the tombs that house the Shadow Court.

The boy is young, seven, six, maybe even younger. He inherited his mother's grayish-blue eyes, though one of them is a little swollen right now. The consequences of the journey and Reaver not being at all delicate when he had dragged them through the Wraithmarsh. He didn't want to waste them on the Balverines.

"Of course," he tells the brat.

Beside him, still trussed up like a bird at a feast, Lady Martin makes a panicked noise. She is no fool, Lady Martin. She got the drop on Sparrow and she evaded his pursuit after he ransacked her manse longer than he would have liked, but she wasn't clever enough to lose him. Her miscalculations on who she has dared to cross have and will continue to cost her dearly. She knows this even if she doesn't know yet how deeply her regret will run.

Reaver kicks her in her already (probably) broken ribs. Her ladyship's scream is muffled by the voluminous gag he stuffed into her mouth; she curls inward, trying in vain to shield her chest with her bound hands. Several feet away her son winces and very nearly drops the seal as he recoils.

With a smile, Reaver puts his boot on Lady Martin's neck. "There now, settle shall we? I'll explain the rules." She whimpers but makes no further attempts to speak. He redirects his attention to the boy. "It's very simple. You take that shiny little trinket and give it to my friends just down that stairwell. You see it?"

A quivering glance is given down the dark stone steps. The boy nods. "Y—y—yes."

"Good lad," Reaver purrs. "That's all there is to it. You give them that trinket, I'll unbind your mother, and the two of you are free to go. I won't fire one bullet in your direction or even stand in your way. Does that sound amenable to you?"

While he seriously doubts that the boy doesn't sense something amiss with the deal, he's too foolish to debate it. Or maybe it's that he's not foolish at all. Either way, things have been looking quite doom-y for mother and son since Reaver caught up with them and slaughtered their guards. He wonders if the boy is cursing her yet. It doesn't matter, all that is important to Reaver is that the child nods his assent.

Beneath his foot, Reaver feels the mother twitching. He presses down just enough for a warning but she never starts to flail. She's too busy weeping.

Reaver waves the boy toward the stairs. "Off you go then. Before I change my mind."

Lady Martin's son blanches beneath his already sickly complexion. He spares only a backwards glance to his mother before he's ambling down the cold, stone steps. Reaver waits for him to disappear from view before hoisting Martin up and onto his shoulder, ignoring her moans of agony as makes his way to one of the many overrun passages in the old place.

On the western side of the room where the Shadow Court sits is a broken terrace. The first time he sacrificed another on the alter he came to watch; an attempt to purge the remnants of regret from his system. Now it makes for a damn good vantage to rub Lady Martin's nose in her mistake.

"_Welcome_."

"_Welcome_."

"_Welcome_."

In over two-hundred years, he has never been able to fend off a chill at the thought of those black figures below. He certainly can't fend it off while he's in their physical presence. Luckily, Lady Martin does not notice, her attentions are fixated on her son who appears to have wet himself.

"_Do you deliver the Dark Seal in the name of Reaver_?" One, or perhaps all, ask.

The boy whimpers something. Fear is too much for him, his knees meet the floor and the puddle of piss he just made, nodding as he offers the Seal toward them with shaking hands.

Reaver grasps Lady Martin by her chin and like a lover, he leans in nuzzling her matted, blood-caked hair, away from her ear as he whispers, "You should watch this."

"_The Sacrifice is accepted_," echoes through the catacombs as malevolent curls of smoke surround the boy. Both mother and son scream in unison as the fog rips away the flush of his youth. Lady Martin is still screaming when the sad husk of saggy flesh and creaking bones that is now her only child falls over.

"There now," he murmurs almost sweetly as he cuts the ropes. He pauses at the bindings on her wrists when an elegant sapphire and white gold signet ring winks at him. Reaver plucks it from her finger; a trophy to remember the day. "I do think that that makes us even, my lady."

He does not wait for her to ungag herself as makes his way upward. True to his word, he'll let them live. The Balverines that he can already hear tracking the scent of blood and urine though? Well, he never promised anything on _their_ behalf.

Reaver sails from Albion that night. His work on all fronts has been seen to. Besides that, he needs to be away from Sparrow. Forever if he can manage it. His deed in the catacombs the stink of banal—_human_—attachment, and leaves the unbearable sensation of Robin curled up in the deep, dark, far-off corner he has been banished to, smiling in satisfaction.

**5.**

Eight years is how long that Reaver manages to hold out against the call to return to Albion's shores. He tells himself during the entire voyage back that he will not go to see Sparrow. He will return to Bloodstone, oversee his business, and leave her to play in the capital. But then one of his agents relays that she's getting married and after shooting the poor fellow, he's steering the _Reaver II_ toward Bowerstone Harbor.

He is not at all sure just what it is exactly he expects to find—or to do, for that matter—when he goes to crash the event. The possibility of shooting all of the guests and staff is, as always, a distinct possibility, however Reaver doubts that even he can become that bored. Not to mention, he's already watched Sparrow take a bullet straight between the eyes; no point in trying to kick that horse's carcass.

She is not the most peg-able person but then again, neither is he. Slipping past her guards, her attendants, and even that over-attentive little valet of hers, Reaver's mind is not made up on what will happen until he pushes open the door to her private chambers.

"_This is a little too much, don't you think?" Oriole asks, tugging at the voluminous skirt of her gown._

_Robin laughs in spite of the fact that his heartbeat seems to have forgotten its rhythm. Red is her color. It brings out the fire that always lingers beneath her skin, makes her eyes all the more sparkling, and the rosy tinge in her cheeks bloom._

"_We're announcing our engagement," he reminds her. "You don't think that it warrants anything grand?"_

"_I'm not opposed to one hell of a party," Oriole says. A smile tugs at the corner of her mouth, all mischief and delight, and she stops playing with her dress to slip over to him. Her arms, so strong from years of hefting both axe and rifle, slide around his waist. She could crush him easily in those arms but Robin knows that is never a danger. He trusts the warmth of Oriole's embrace more than he trusts his own infallible aim._

"_Honestly though?" She tilts her head, leaning up and in to graze the underside of his jaw as she speaks. Robin fights off a tremor, biting down hard on his lower lip. Her eyes glow like the embers of a campfire beneath her long, fluttering lashes. "I'd much rather just skip ahead to the wedding night."_

_Robin grins. "Well, that's impossible. However, we _can_ certainly practice for the event though."_

_Oriole grins in return. "Mmm…I like that."_

Reaver suppresses a growl deep in his throat and shoves Robin along with his useless memories back into the pit that they belong in. He didn't come here for this foolishness.

_Then what did you come for? _A far too smug, Robin-like voice demands.

Humph. Fair point.

He doesn't need a reason, he decides. This is a party, after all, and he is ever so charming at a party.

"I heard it was happening but I scarce believed it true," he announces himself with gusto, removing his hat and bowing deeply as Sparrow turns about to face him. He smirks at her; she doesn't look surprised to see him. "The Hero of Bowerstone is to wed. Enchanting."

She turns back to her vanity, though he sees her nose wrinkling in the mirror's surface as she returns her attentions to her hair.

"If you killed Jasper or any of my guards to get in, you're going to spend the rest of your immortal life missing some very pleasurable but non-vital pieces."

Ah, he has missed that superiority she always attempts to feign. "Perish the thought," he says. "I would never sully your special day with blood. Not unless you asked."

"Hmm." She arches a slim eyebrow and continues setting her hair.

He takes the continued lack of disdain as an invitation and slips closer. He's certain that she notes it. "You know, most queens have maids for that sort of thing. Especially for impressive events."

"How handy it is that I'm not a queen yet." She turns to look at him again when he's less than an arm's length away. Brown eyes look him over curiously, lingering on his face. He can hear the hum of questions unasked on her tongue. They never escape past her lips however. Yet another thing to appreciate about Sparrow, even if she's a goody-goody; her common sense is her greatest power.

That deserves a reward.

He reaches out to push the satin material of her slip up until the lacy hem is gathered at her waist. His gloved hands slide along the backs of her thighs and there can be no mistaking the trembling of the muscles beneath. Sparrow does not recoil from the touch, in fact her breath hitches and she welcomes his return fully by wrapping both arms about his neck.

"What happened to not sullying the day?" she murmurs with a slight smile.

"With blood. Sullying the bride herself is another matter entirely," Reaver says, lifting her onto the dressing table and taking her smalls as he does. That earns a laugh which he is only too happy to swallow by slanting his mouth to Sparrow's.

He has been hungry for her, he realizes as he takes her against the vanity. Starving for her legs as they round his waist, the puff of her breath against his neck, and the high, needy whines that escape when he has her teetering on the edge of a climax. Most of all he has unknowingly craved that pulse that rings between them, that maddening thrum of Hero's blood as it boils.

"So," he says after their passions are spent—momentarily—and he's helping her into her wedding gown. "The dress would be the something new, where are old, borrowed, and blue in this _ensemble fantastique_?"

Sparrow chuckles. "Since when are you superstitious?"

"Since always," he returns as he finishes with the laces on her bodice. His hands linger at her back then slide to her shoulders, gripping them as he leans in to graze the shell of her ear with his teeth. "Why, I always have a rabbit's foot in my pocket."

"Is that what we're calling it now?" she asks, tilting her head back as she leans into him.

Chuckling, Reaver encircles her waist with both arms and admires their reflections in the mirror. Sparrow's gown is uncomplicated, even a little dull. It works for her though. Something in her lights things up. Layers of otherwise plain white satin and silk with their sparse gold trimmings glow against her skin. If nothing else comes from this day, at least she has made a fetching bride.

_As Oriole never had the chance to._

Reaver suppresses a snarl, ducking his head as he does. Glancing down, he finds a reasonable excuse.

"Here." For eight years, he has kept Lady Elmira Martin's signet ring on his person for reasons that he cannot quite explain; nor would he care to think of them. It fit on his little finger rather snugly, on the third finger of Sparrow's right hand however, it sits as perfection.

Sparrow holds her arm out, an approving look on her face. "Borrowed and Blue?"

"And Old. I think."

She turns to kiss him with an ardor and a softness that he cannot recall being present in the touch of her lips before. It is not wholly unfamiliar however. As is the smoldering fire in her eyes when she finally pulls back and whispers, "Thank you, it's beautiful," in a voice that he's sure only he could ever hear.

"My lady." Sparrow's valet does not appear even slightly surprised at what he has walked in upon. All that gives away any sort of astonishment is bright flush in his cheeks.

"Yes, Jasper?" Neither of them had jumped at the sound of the young man's voice, and Sparrow continues to remain pressed against Reaver now, as if she isn't about to be married to another. That action, or rather _inaction_, pleases Reaver far more than he can logically explain.

"The ceremony is set to begin shortly, Madame," he advises. "Ser Derek is waiting in the hall to escort you."

"Tell him that I'll be with him momentarily and keep him there." Her tone is serene but there's no mistaking the order. Jasper certainly does not. He bows deeply, says, "At once, Madame," and then disappears, quiet as he came.

The door closes and Sparrow sighs, shaking her head with a rueful smile. "I suppose I should get on with this whole marriage/coronation business." She worries her lower lip between her teeth. "You're staying?"

No. That should be his answer. He needs to leave, to go back to the sea, and be as far away from her and the idiot things that this goody-two-shoes with her damnable imposter face does to him.

Instead, he says, "I can't very well leave a party, can I?"

"Not in all the time I've known you, no," she laughs. Taking a step back, Sparrow straightens his waistcoat and smooths the lapels on his jacket. As an afterthought, she pulls a rose from her bouquet and arranges it as his boutonnière. "There. Perfect for a royal wedding."

"Likewise," he says as he fixes her veil in place. "By the way, who _is_ your unlucky groom?"

"Lord Thomas Danforth," Sparrow says. "Old blood, rich, and very pretty. You'll like him."

"I'm sure that I will." He kisses her hand, right above the ring. "Save me a dance, Your-soon-to-be-Majesty?"

She grins. "We'll see."

Thomas Danforth gives Sparrow another ring that day, a gaudy, oversized diamond thing, and claims her hand in marriage. Reaver dances with her three times at the reception and not two days later, she's in his bed. More nights belong to him than they do to her husband over the next two years. All of them are good because he doesn't dream at all when she lies next to him; Robin doesn't make a peep. Perhaps because he's too busy being self-righteous inside of his vault.

**6.**

Keep him around. How dare she. Just because there's a crown on her pretty head doesn't give her any real authority over him and she should know it. Let her build her little school and share her wealth. She can find someone else to cuckold that stiff-shirted fool of a husband with.

Reaver tells himself, after the incident in Brightwall, that he is never going to see Sparrow again. Absolutely never. All thoughts and musings in relation to Albion's queen are forbidden.

If only it could be that simple.

During the first two weeks of his self-exile, he does not sleep at all. He can't, what with the dreams returning _en mass_ the second that he tries to sleep in a bed without the intention of sharing it with her ever again. For two and a half years, the phantoms of Robin's life have not stirred. Not a whisper, not a tremulous echo, not single murmur from the shadows. The moment that he swears off her company though, he is flooded.

Half of Bloodstone is killed in those first two weeks before he sets sail. Proximity is the issue, Reaver decides. If he puts a few thousand miles between them, then then she will be forgotten just as her processor was.

Only that doesn't work because Oriole was never truly forgotten. Thousands of miles, thousands of raids, thousands of faces and bodies more beautiful than hers, and it's still that once face leading the charge in all of his nightmares. He holds for four years this time, though even at the end of those four years, he doesn't have the intention of returning to Sparrow. And then he finds his sails set toward the monstrous black needle that sits just off of Albion's shoreline.

Something in his guts, something that stinks of Robin, guides him to the Spire and try as he might he cannot shake it away. A storm is brewing on the horizon when he docks; the sky matches the ancient stonework Lucien mimicked in his ham-handed attempt to twist fate. Black, cold, and still somehow full of fire.

Reaver's last visit here was impromptu and (mercifully) short. Still, he hasn't forgotten the buzzing that the place brought to his bones, making even his teeth itch with disquiet. He had also not forgotten the choking grasp of magical displacement. His stomach rolls and his head pounds as one moment he's standing in the vast, dank, bowels of what had once been Lucien's naval base, and the next he's on the dais where the power had very nearly been ripped from his veins thirty years ago.

Theresa stands in the center, as if she has not moved since that day, awaiting his return. Which, actually, is probably accurate, given her particular gifts.

Still, she must be insufferable—because when has she ever not been?—and ask, "Ah, and what brings the Thief to my doorstep?" With a smile no less.

The only reason that he doesn't shoot is because he's sure that it would not kill her.

Why did he come here though? The question rattles at the back of his mind. Of all places, why here? Why to her?

And then, from the voluminous folds of her robes, she pulls three cards and tosses them at his feet. They are old, tattered, and stained but still very clear. They also cause the blood to freeze in his veins. These cards have been laid out for him before; or something close enough to it.

"_The Fork in the Road." Gnarled hands pull the first card from the deck, holding it out towards Robin. He accepts it only because he is too stunned to do otherwise. On it is illustrated a simple road, branching off in two directions; the right is sunny and the left goes into the darkness. "The path that goes beneath the light is warm, clear. Boring." She cackles a little at that and Robin shivers beneath her milky, sightless eyes. "Now the path in the dark? Oh it's treacherous but look at the rewards. You like rewards, don't you, Sweet Robin?"_

_She is right. Robin spies blood on the trail. But there are also bright blooming roses and sharp thorns. The path in the light has only the sky and fields. Something in him quivers excitedly at the shadowy left turn._

"_The Pact." A second card is placed in his hands. On it are youthful hands being filled with treasure by a skeletal pair as dark, unfriendly eyes look on. Robin's stomach twists and turns. "Everything has a price, never doubt. But what price is too much for the fulfillment of your deepest desires?"_

_His tongue is frozen to the back of his teeth. His mouth is dry as a bone._

"_The Maiden Fair and the Queen Fierce." The final card. Two women or perhaps they are the same woman. The top figure is clad in white and clutching flowers, her face is tranquil, eyes closed. With the flowers clutched to her chest she appears to be awaiting, like a bride at an altar. Or, perhaps, a corpse awaiting kind hands to lower her into the ground. The second woman holds a sword instead of flowers, and wears full armor. Her eyes are open, wide, alert, sharp. She is alive and ready to do battle. Both bear a striking resemblance to his Oriole._

"_The Maiden is a pretty thing, sweet, innocent, kind," the Fortune teller whispers. "But the Queen? She is __**fire**__, Sweet Robin. She is the guardian of the world. The Maiden is a desire, the Queen is a necessity—__**if **__there is to be survival. They are two sides of the same coin, you see, they are the same soul, but the Maiden must fall for the Queen to take her place."_

Those cards. Those fucking cards. They were left on Oriole's grave with the betrothal ring that she gave to Robin.

In his cage, Robin is gnashing his teeth and shaking the bars. Reaver himself, feels his composure cracking for the first time in over two-hundred years' worth of nasty surprises.

"_You_." It's the only word that he can get out but it is the only word that he needs. The rage pulsing through him will kill one of them. Preferably her.

"There were no lies," Theresa says, still calm, with her hands folded at her waist. "_You_ made your bargain, all of your own accord. You chose your road. And the Maiden returned to be the Queen."

Reaver does not have regrets. They are not something that he can have. He cannot exist as he does with anything even remotely like regret seeding in him.

But Robin can. That little fool has been glutted on regrets; and he is unfortunately, not as dead and buried as Reaver would prefer. That's the only explanation that he can offer himself when the question of "Why?" stumbles from between his gritted teeth.

"She was needed here at the right time," the seer says. "As were you. You lived. She died. Then she returned. Compelled, she sought you out and you were reunited, as was meant to be."

"_Why?_" he demands again, this time leveling his Dragonstomper at her.

She has the audacity to laugh and that leaves him no choice. He shoots but the moment that he does, the Spire melts away. In the blink of an eye it is replaced with the familiar streets of Bowerstone. The familiar and _wet_ streets of Bowerstone; the storm that had been threatening when he arrived at the Spire has finally burst and is all but flooding Albion's capital.

_You created a Queen to match your King._ Theresa's voice scratches up his spine and echoes in Reaver's skull. Only the clench of his teeth down into the soft meat of his cheek keeps him from shivering. She will not be given the pleasure. _Perhaps you should return to her side now?_

The sensation of lightning fizzling out around him comes and then there is only the sound of the storm. The buzzing in his head is gone—she is gone, but he is still marooned beneath the downpour.

Bowerstone Castle, formerly Castle Fairfax, looms in the not actually-too-far-off distance. The lights in and around it are bright, unwavering in the storm. It stands as a sentinel. And as a beacon.

Reaver intends to turn. Too much of what he has done has been the product of manipulation and that is intolerable. He is Reaver. He is beyond these games and he certainly doesn't need to some shoddy copy of a skeleton.

_No_. Robin again rattles the bars of his cage. _Not a copy. Not just her face. It's __**her**__. It's her!_

_Which makes forgetting her all the more important!_ Reaver snarls to himself.

It is too late though, Robin has wormed his way out of his prison just enough to take control of Reaver's legs, and he finds himself dashing toward the castle as fast as his long legs can carry him.

Sense doesn't take a complete backseat as Robin-the-impulse supersedes Reaver's limbs. His memories of the gardens are still crystal clear, as well as the many ways to get into the castle through them. It's easier than raiding an overstuffed merchant vessel and that is Reaver's specialty. He almost shoots her guards on principle, pleased as he is with how he can slip right by all of them. If he were an assassin and Sparrow a monarch without Hero blood, he'd have her head in seconds, no small thanks to her employees.

Once inside of her rooms however, Robin falters and Reaver is left on his own. Incredible sight like his has a great deal of nocturnal allowances. When the dark is as thick as pitch, he can still make out everything within a good twenty yard radius. With dim embers and ambient light filtering in from undrawn curtains, there are no details that he hidden from him.

Sparrow is fast asleep, black hair fanned across the her silk pillow, pretty features still, unbothered by dreams. An open book rests against her breast, fingers still curled over the spine, albeit loosely. In an enormous bed, she still favors the right side, as if she were leaving room.

_She always waited._ Robin whispers. _Always_.

Reaver has the very powerful urge to put the Dragonstomper in his mouth and see if maybe, just maybe, he could obliterate that damn fool once and for all.

Thoughts of ruining his pretty face cease as Sparrow rouses. Her large eyes flutter in the darkness, as the sense of something not quite right takes hold of her, drawing tense lines along her shoulders and jaw. Her gaze, clouded from sleep, flicks toward him and even he is impressed at the speed with which she reacts to finding someone in her bedroom.

Out of bed she rolls, stopping time in the process. There is a pistol in one hand when she stands upright and the other flexes, ready to cast.

"Reaver?" Confusion and surprise line her face when she realizes just who has infiltrated her rooms. She doesn't drop her pistol either. Good sense, absolutely her most beautiful feature. Those big brown eyes travel up and down his soaked form, growing more perplexed with every inch that they scan. "What the hell do you think you're doing?!"

Reaver makes no attempt to answer her question. Instead, he strips his gloves and coat and tosses them to the floor. He has to touch her; there is nothing else in the world that he wants, nothing that he has ever wanted as much as to touch Sparrow in this moment. Bewildered, she doesn't shrug his hands away as they smooth over her neck and cup her chin. Her flesh feels like fire against his, surely in no small part due to his running about in the rain, but she doesn't shiver.

He runs his thumb across that stubborn chin, rubbing circles over the freckle marking the right edge of her jaw. Everything is the same but everything is different. It cannot be good for him to stay, the Spire Witch has planned too much, and he doesn't want her to have the satisfaction. He doesn't want her to have _her_.

But Reaver's desire—or is it Robin's?—cannot be stemmed. Oriole or Sparrow or both, he wants this woman before him. Wants her with the kind of fervor he usually reserves for ensuring that the Shadow Court never runs out of fodder for their bargain. And as Robin so readily agreed to the penalties of that pact so long ago, Reaver damns the consequences now.

Covering Sparrow's mouth with his own, he swallows her whimper of surprise. For a moment, she is stiff, unresponsive, possibly considering murder, but then the pistol falls from her fingertips. She sighs and melts into him, unmindful of his sodden clothes and cold skin.

That night is one of the most intense in his memory. It's as if he's never touched her before. For technicality's sake, the knowledge Theresa spilled at his feet does make things different. Makes her different. Not that he cares. All that matters is the heat of Sparrow's body coiled around his, her taste, the way that she breathes his name, and the song her pulse sings as it rushes with his.

Dawn has come and gone by the time that they've drained themselves with pleasure. His body feels boneless, almost crushed from ecstasy, though he doesn't mind the weight of Sparrow's head upon his chest. He curls his fingers through tendrils of ebony and willingly allows sleep to take him for the first time in years. He has no dreams.

**7.**

He isn't sure why he ventures to the palace the day after the boy is born. Curiosity, perhaps. He did help make it after all; he should probably have a look.

Sparrow is asleep when Jasper sees him into her chambers. Exhausted but not worrisomely so, the glow that had been sticking to her for the last several months is still present. Her slumber seems untroubled.

While Reaver can't exactly say that he's happy for her peace, he isn't unhappy with it either and he sees no reason to disturb it. Or allow anyone else to do so.

The boy is in a gilded bassinet beside her. Swaddled in blue satin, he's horribly pink and splotchy, with rumpled features that barely seem human at all. Like his mother, he slumbers contentedly.

_Dahlia's baby is the first and only that Robin ever holds. She's small, pink, fussy, and smells strange. He is rather fond of the small package though, and he doesn't think that he feels that way just because Dahlia is the most tolerable of all of his beloved's many sisters._

"_How many are we having?" Oriole asks as she tickles her niece's chin. The tone is coy, but Robin is no dunce. There is a ring on her finger, a wedding promised on the horizon, the natural progression of this kind of thing is now resting in his arms._

_Though hopefully better looking._

_He smiles at her, "How many do you want?"_

"_Definitely less than my parents," she says with a roll of her eyes and he stifles a laugh in the collar of his shirt. Twelve children have grown up in Oriole's home, and as the youngest of that brood, his lover has never found any appeal in crowds._

"_Not-twelve is still rather broad, darling," he says._

_Oriole's nose wrinkles at him, but just briefly and she nods in concession. "Point taken." She leans against him, resting her head to his arm. He leans toward her as well and their lips brush._

"_Two," she says with a dreamy look in her eyes._

"_Just two?" he asks, raising a skeptical brow. Oriole nips the corner of his mouth._

"_Two," she confirms. "Three are negotiable but any more than that and you can carry them."_

_He laughs. "Hmm. I don't think that my narrow hips would survive that."_

"_No," she agrees. "No, I don't think that they would either."_

_Gentle silence stretches between them as they look at one another. Robin can already see a small body with her hair and his eyes getting underfoot._

"_Do you have any names you like yet?" he asks as she nuzzles his cheek._

"_Mmm…just for a boy," she says. Oriole's eyes sparkle and she bites her lip. "Logan."_

_Robin flags an eyebrow but grins. "For Grandfather?"_

_She nods. "I thought you'd like that."_

"_You know me so well."_

Reaver is not sure what he expected when he picked the boy up. Maybe some crying, but Sparrow's son surprises him. A yawn and a wriggle are all that he gets as he settles the newborn in the crook of his arm.

Pleasure is a thing that he can understand. As is pain, frustration, lust, hunger; primal things. The sort of feelings that forge connections between humans though? Those have been dead within him a good long time. Reaver looks down at his son and doesn't think that he is filled with any of what a father should feel when holding his child for the first time. Not like Robin would have.

What he does feel is…A kind of want, perhaps? Mixed liberally with curiosity. To see what this soft, defenseless blob will eventually become. The stock that he comes from, he will at least have taste, of that much Reaver is sure.

He wonders what his aim will be like. Allowing Sparrow to teach the boy how to shoot is out of the question. She's remarkable compared to a non-Hero, but Reaver would argue that that isn't saying much. She goes for sheer power without so much as an attempt at accuracy, hence those clunky rifles that she insists on hauling about; she would probably do better to use the damn things as clubs. Which, if his memory serves right, she's gone ahead and done just that on multiple occasions.

"Better bloody well never catch you doing anything so gouache," he informs the boy. All the response that he gets is a yawn.

Hmm. Well someone is certainly going to be his mother's son.

And speaking of the mother, Reaver notes that she is stirring. He watches through the corner of his eye as Sparrow comes to. Perhaps it's lingering weakness from the child-bed, or that whatever tincture that she was given by her physician was very strong, or that sleep has her addled, it could even be all three. What Reaver finds interesting is that not a muscle in her tenses when she glances up and finds him holding the baby.

"The whole kingdom is drunk over this toothless little thing," he says, giving her a nod as he makes a slow path toward her bed. "I'm trying to see what's so special but I haven't quite caught on."

Sparrow chuckles, warm and bright as she adjusts herself against the pillows. "He's hope, silly." she says. "You're holding Albion's future. He'll be her king one day."

Reaver isn't so sure about how he feels on that. Fortuitous for him though it may be, putting the future in his hands seems…unwise. At least for everyone else. Not that he cares but it's always a better plan to be in the queen's good graces than out of them. Less messy.

"Well, if this is where things are going, I must say that I'm not all that impressed." he says with a snort, handing the baby over to his mother. Sparrow settles the boy on the pillow beside her so that she can recline on her side and look at him.

There is both serenity and endless wonder on the other Hero's face as she stares down at her son. Were it anyone else, Reaver would roll his eyes dismissing such a thing as unbearably saccharine. But as with all things surrounding Sparrow, Reaver finds what should-be more than just a little muddled and he's not careless enough dissect it.

"Have you thought of a name yet?" he asks, unsure of why he does. He perches on the end of her bed.

Sparrow shakes her head without looking up. She's intent on stroking the boy's cheek. "No. Well, I made a few lists but I haven't settled on anything. Besides, I hear that it's bad luck to—"

"—to name a baby before it's been in the world three days." He finishes the adage for her, smirking at the surprise it brings to her face.

Shit, how many times had Robin heard Dahlia say that? How many times did Robin and Oriole roll their eyes after she did?

He cocks his head to the side as he gazes the boy. The future of Albion. Small, helpless, not exactly pretty (in his opinion); it seems completely appropriate. But still, Reaver finds that sort-of want, that interest in just how something so insignificant in appearance could have so much potential ahead, remains strong in his thoughts. As it will for quite some time, or so he imagines.

A cue to leave if any and Reaver resolves to do just that. He kisses Sparrow goodbye because he wants to and sees no reason to deny the impulse, before pulling on his cloak. At the door however, Robin who has cleverly remained silent, the clever bastard, creeps up into Reaver's throat just as he takes hold of the door handle.

"If 'Logan' isn't already on the list I recommend it."

* * *

**Author's Notes:** So, yet again, writing got away from me and there is going to be yet another chapter. I am trying really, really, REALLY hard to make sure that this ends at seven. I will probably fail, considering that when I started this, I was only going to do three chapters. I blame Reaver. He's an attention whore with too much to say. But, if you've played the game, that's a give in. Right? Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter!


	6. To Make You Stay

**Disclaimer****: **I don't own, never claimed to, please don't sue me.

* * *

**1.**

For whatever reason, Sparrow goes on with his suggestion and names the boy Logan. Reaver would like to be pleased about this, would like to brag in court and on the street; he named the queen's heir. But he is not pleased. When he hears "Prince Logan" heralded through the streets, it makes his backbone crawl and on the odd chance that he sees the boy, it twists something deep, deep, deep down in his guts. Logan was the son that Robin should have given Oriole, and whenever he hears the name of Sparrow's child, Reaver remembers that. Not even an orgy and half of the wine in Bowerstone can make that twisting thing inside dissipate.

Like all tedious human things though, Reaver learns to work around it until it becomes a whisper he can lock away and forget—most of the time. It helps that Sparrow doesn't want his involvement in rearing the child. He can avoid court when the young prince is present, and when the boy old enough to attend at most events, Reaver pays respects and then stays clear until he isn't around. For quite some time this method works.

And then the boy ruins it.

His intent in the palace that day is to request a favor from Sparrow for one of his many business ventures. Mostly. The fact that he also hasn't seen her in several months is weighing in as well, and that hunger that he has for her is starting to impeded his already shaky sleep cycle with unheard of severity. Reaver needs Sparrow's legs around his waist and soon, lest lack of sleep starts to impede his charm. It is an unfortunate thing then, that upon his arrival at the castle, he is informed that Her Majesty has had to make an emergency trip to Brightwall.

He almost shoots the page who delivers the message to him. It is a testament to his affairs with Sparrow that his itching fingers do not pull take the handle of his Dragonstomper. He still sends the girl running with his scowl, but certainly no one can blame him for that.

The detour he takes through the gardens is an unconscious one. They are lovely and all, as much as manicured lawns and shrubbery can be. Reaver finds himself staring up at the little room (little for the palace anyway) that can only be accessed by the garden staircase. Every coupling since the boy came along has been in that room. Perhaps it might even be fair to say that that room is their room.

Fair but dangerous.

He closes his eyes and he can feel the bed's satin sheets tangling with his legs, the soft warmth of Sparrow's skin as it slides against his, and the soft, keening breaths that she'll puff against his ear. A hot coil twists in his belly; Avo's balls, it has been far, far too long…

Indignation and disgust roll in at once. Reaver bites the inside of his cheek hard enough to draw blood and growls at the back of his throat. Pining over her? Like some lovelorn, little fool? Unacceptable. He is Reaver. He is a king—no an emperor! No, a titan! She might have the formal throne but would she have that much without him?

Robin's voice slips into his subconscious like a puff of smoke. She would have what is important, is the whisper that the broken little wretch brings to him. She would have her safety.

He bites down another snarl and the impulse to shoot himself in the foot to spite the ghost. For half a second, when he hears the pop of pistol, he thinks that he might just have done it. But this sound is too meek to have come from his Dragonstomper, and too far off.

Since Reaver never denies his curiosity, he follows the noise. Through the gardens he strolls, into the gauche hedge maze that Sparrow's consort has had grown. He assumes it is a page or two skulking about. The queen and that lumbering fool that she's replaced her dog with (Walter) have left the grounds, the princess-consort is holding a salon, and most of the staff is otherwise occupied with whatever it is that underlings typically do to keep a castle running; what better time could there be to sneak in a bit of target practice?

He's right about the sneaking target practice part; however he finds no page at the heart of the maze.

Logan does not notice him at first; he's too focused on keeping the pistol steady. It isn't a particularly large weapon, but in the hands of a nine-year-old (Skorm aflame, is he really that old already?) it's a tad cumbersome. Around the hedgerows are several padded targets, looking as if they were hastily set. All of them have bullet holes that pepper very close to the center.

Memories of Robin holding a toy gun for the first time surface. The boy's aim had not been perfection. That did not come until later, after the cracking voice, aching bones, and awkward sweat-soaked mornings that marked the start of his march into adulthood. Until then, Robin was very, very good but not flawless.

_There was help getting there too…_ Robin's phantom whispers in his ear.

"_Steady your arm, lad." The scent of salt-spray, tobacco, and spicy but not overbearing cologne envelope Robin as he aims his pistol toward several paper lanterns that sway at the dock's end. Their glow is soft and warm in the twilight; he might even dare to call them beautiful. Robin belly twists at the thought of bringing them down._

_Hard but gentle fingers comb through his hair. He tilts his head up, following the crisp blue line of jacket sleeve that the hand is attached to, up to the embroidered breast pocket that holds an artfully folded handkerchief, to the words "Adm. L. Stanchion Esq." stitched across it in gold thread. Above that, there is a weathered face with kind smile peeking out from beneath a neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard. Blue eyes, eyes that Robin has often been told are identical to his own, twinkle down at him._

"_They're only lights, Pluck," Grandfather says, not unkindly or with an ounce of impatience._

"_I know," Robin whispers, feeling his cheeks flush with shame. "But…If I shoot them out…what light will we have left?"_

_Grandfather chuckles and tilts Robin's head upward. Soft diamond pinpoints and a silvery disk have begun to seep through the purple skyline._

"_There's always light when you look for it, Pluck," Grandfather says, smoothing his knuckles through Robin's hair once again. "And unlike those lanterns, these ones will always come back on for you."_

_The pistol is taken into Grandfather's hands and down the lanterns go in quick succession, bathing their little pier in darkness. Robin is afraid only for a moment. Grandfather is behind him still and above the moon and her stars still shine. He is safe, even in the darkness._

"Oh!"

The prince's startled exclamation pulls Reaver back to the present. The boy fumbles in his surprise, nearly dropping the weapon. His small hands shake, the barrel flips and for a scant second Reaver feels something that might be panic crawl up his gullet as Sparrow's son has the blasted pistol aimed at himself.

His reaction is so fast that Reaver cannot even comprehend it until after it has happened. The gun discharges as it hits the ground, knocked away by his hand, and a scorch mark is left amidst chipped cobblestone where the boy once stood.

"Wow," Logan says looking up from where he's being clutched to Reaver's side. His eyes are sable-brown, just like his mother's, but wider. "You're really fast."

The young prince gazes up at him with admiration, which Reaver is used to given the fans and sycophants a reputation such his acquires en masse. What he is not used to is tasting his heartbeat at the back of his throat and the lack of smugness that comes with being praised. There is still some, he is Reaver after all, but he the normal inclination to strut and brag is absent. No, there is an alien thing needling his chest that demands that he grab Logan by the nape of the neck and shake him until his teeth rattle then lock him away in a tower where he will be safe from his own harebrained ideas. In a fashion, he gives in to this bizarre impulse.

Reaver turns and kneels, grasping the boy's shoulders. He does not shake him, that would be pointless and would almost definitely leave a mark which Sparrow would have his head over. And also, from Robin's memories, Reaver knows that at the prince's age, words cut the deepest wounds.

"Your mother boasts about what a clever boy she has ad nauseam, you know." Reaver speaks slowly, making sure that Logan's eyes are locked with his for the careful enunciation of each word. That small frame shudders while his pale face flushes. "It does not do Her Majesty credit when your actions so grievously contradict her words."

The prince flinches as though he were slapped. Reaver finds that he does not enjoy such a reaction; in fact, he distinctly dislikes being the reason for tears glinting at the edges of those eyes so completely like Sparrow's. He also despises the sanctimonious tone that his voice has taken, as if he were the lad's teacher. Yet he cannot regret what is said either.

"Why are you out here by yourself?" he demands as he releases the boy. Without a thought, Reaver pulls the silk handkerchief from his breast pocket and gives it to Logan, sparing the prince some dignity by looking away while he rights himself. "As well as I know Spar—Her Majesty, you should have several very well paid instructors fighting just for the chance to lecture you on what a trigger is."

"Master Swain is ill," Logan tells him after he's composed himself. "And Walter has gone with Mother. Besides, we only ever practice with rifles." He tilts his head, nose scrunching. "I don't think I like rifles. They don't feel right. They're too…big." The lad looks down at his hands, as if picturing one of those clunky turret monsters his mother insists on carrying.

Rifles feel wrong, eh? Well, if Reaver had ever doubted Sparrow claiming that her pregnancy was his doing (he did not), he certainly would not now. A smile curls upon his lips.

The boy tilts his head to the side, looking up at him with curiosity now. Reaver notes the differences in Logan's eyes to his mother's. They're softer, swathed with youthful naiveté that Reaver has never even seen hint of in Sparrow. His jaw, padded by baby fat as it is, is sharper than hers as well, his skin is lighter, and Reaver just knows that the lad is going to stand well-above his mother in a few short years. All of those traits he also knows are from him, just like this disregard for large firearms.

"You're Mother's friend, the other Hero," Logan interrupts his thoughts. "I've seen you at court. They say that you helped her to save the world." Those large eyes brighten.

Unable to resist—now that alarm isn't choking him—Reaver preens and bows deep, taking off his hat.

"The one and only Reaver at your service, Your Royal Highness," he tells Sparrow's son. "And yes, I have dabbled at playing the savior once or twice with your esteemed mother." He's prouder of himself than he probably should be when he doesn't tack on something lewd.

The excitement playing across Logan's features pleases Reaver more than he can explain. It also makes Robin twist and fit within his prison but Reaver kicks the vault door shut.

"There's no better marksman in all of the world," the boy continues. "Everyone says so. Even Mother."

He isn't bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet, shaking with glee, hell, he's not even grinning. Still though, Reaver can feel the enthusiasm radiating from Logan like overpriced perfume on a backwater noble and does not disapprove of it.

He is very intrigued that Sparrow has admitted to other people that he is better at something than she is. Rather sneaky of her but he'll forgive it.

"Well, arguing with Her Majesty is something one will never find me doing." At least not in public.

The boy laughs, a soft, genuine sound, the like of which Reaver has not heard before. From the glimpses he has caught over the years, Logan has inherited Sparrow's penchant for quiet diffidence; at least in public. He'll be quite the dour king someday. A king who will need to learn to protect his throne all on his own because his mother cannot cosset him forever.

"Would you like a lesson, Your Royal Highness?" Reaver asks the question before he has time to think about it and Logan responds before he can take it back.

"Oh, yes, please!" The momentary exuberance is short-lived but amusing nonetheless. Ever his mother's son, the prince catches himself and feigns a cough while he straightens up and nods with a seriousness that makes his young face appear ancient. "I mean, yes. I would very much enjoy that, Lord Reaver."

"Splendid," he says. Sweeping up the pistol Logan had brought out, Reaver takes a moment to examine it. The craftsmanship is well enough, but it is older and has not been used in some time. Reaver suspects that the boy pulled it from a display while no one was keeping an eye out. Clever lad. Something else Reaver can chalk up to his blood.

"Lesson the first, Your Royal Highness, always choose a weapon that fits you," he tells the boy as he sets aside the first gun. From his boot, he pulls one of the lighter pistols in his collection, a polished clockwork revolver. In his hands, it looks tiny, but when he places it in Logan's it is, to coin a phrase, just right.

It occurs to Reaver, as he stands behind the boy, adjusting his stance with gentle prods and direction, that this is the first time that he has touched his son since Logan was a newborn. This is their first real conversation, their first real interaction, and given the barrier that both he and Sparrow have constructed, it very well could be the last. The thought of such irritates him but he cannot fathom why.

Because he is ours, Robin taunts.

"Lord Reaver?" the boy breaks up the argument welling within him before it can even start. When he glances down, he finds the lad gnawing at his lower lip. "You—you won't tell Mother that I was shooting unsupervised…Will you?"

The pathetic state of such a plea should disgust him. He should sneer and scowl and push the boy away. At the very least he should extort him; demand that the child pocket the royal treasury key and deliver it to him perhaps.

But Reaver's personal wealth is almost a match for the Crown's and he has no real desire to level Albion's coffers. Even less so, are his desires to pull Logan into the center of conflict, to use him.

Because he has living tools enough at his disposal, and his son will not be one of them.

Reaver kneels again, molding his hand over Logan's as it aims the revolver. His arm and chest are flush with the boy and should he cant his neck an inch or two, his chin could rest on atop Logan's head. He can remember the smell of him as an infant, new and strange and vulnerable and soft in the world and Reaver swears that that scent lingers on him yet.

"I will strike a bargain with you, My Prince," Reaver tells him as he adjusts Logan's grip on the gun. "If you do not tell your lovely mother about this little lesson, then I shall not bring up the reason I thought it best to give it to you. Agreed?"

Logan tilts his head back, grinning. "Yes, sir. Thank you."

"You are welcome." Gently, Reaver's free hand nudges Logan's chin, returning his face forward. "Now, keep your eyes on the target, Your Royal Highness. That is a must."

Sound advice, and some which, should Reaver care to think more intently upon it, he should probably keep in mind himself, rather than nudging at the Line that Sparrow and he have put up between themselves.

**2.**

He very nearly kicks the girl the first time that he meets her. One moment Reaver is standing by the grand fountain in the castle gardens, grousing over the fact that Sparrow's valet had directed him to find her here rather than fetching her himself, and the next there is a weight against his boot. A weight that he discovers upon looking down, is a small person. A small person with Sparrow's thick black hair and a pair of very familiar blue eyes.

He had not planned to be gone nearly this long. The Eastern Kingdoms are just so interesting. Not to mention that establishing a good smuggling route for his little armada isn't something that can be rushed, even with the murders of his rivals; though he does take that precaution. Still, he relishes the return to Albion; the Shadow Court must be fed and as very entertaining as the ladies are in the East, he never slept soundly next to any of them. Indeed, he is at the point that fucking Sparrow has become a necessity if only to get a good night's rest.

Of all of the changes that could take place in just over three years though, he certainly wasn't expecting a baby to be one of them. He's shooting each and every one of his informants for neglecting this detail. First, however, Reaver intends to examine the creature clinging to his boot.

"'Lo," she says smiling up at him. Friendly. Logan has never been like that, as far as Reaver can recall. He has good manners of course, and he's kindhearted, but Reaver never observed the boy going up to strangers and demanding attention, even as toddler. Sparse as his interaction has been with the lad, he's kept close enough eyes on the crown prince to know his behavior very well.

Intrigued, Reaver returns the smile and kneels before the girl. "Hello."

The girl's response is to giggle and pull the hat right off of his head. Under normal circumstances, such an offense would be worthy of the roar and spit of his Dragonstomper. With her it is…somewhat amusing. Mostly because she overestimates the cumbersomeness of a wide brim and so many large feathers. Onto her bottom she topples, giggling even harder beneath the hat.

Reaver snorts and lifts the girl up, setting her on the edge of the fountain. "Well, aren't you ridiculous?" He adjusts the hat in her grip and she immediately puts the closest bit of it in her mouth. Reaver wrinkles his nose as the girl slobbers all over some of the world's finest velveteen. He makes no move to stop her though.

"Ugh. I refuse to believe that you're my issue," he tells her. "I don't make nincompoops with such blatant disregard for good fabric."

She doesn't understand him, he knows that. Even so, meeting those eyes is as good as a "yes, I am" because he cannot argue back against them.

That same strange almost-want that brushed him when he held Logan over a decade ago rears its head as Reaver stares back into the mirror of those eyes. Her face is mostly her mother's albeit fairer, rounder, and brighter. None of her mother's reservation is in those eyes though.

There is a future of wild laughter and running ahead of this one. She is going to be lightning in the flesh. Masses will swoon with each step that she takes and hearts will fracture with the slightest flutter of her lashes.

That makes him…proud. Almost. In a way. Some very close relation to the definition at least.

He feels eyes on him right before the girl exclaims, "Mummy!" and leaps from her perch.

Surprise has made Sparrow's chocolate eye wider than is normal; or perhaps they're always like that nowadays. Four years isn't a short time. At least not for other people.

It isn't an unhappy surprise, simply shock at seeing him in the flesh. Had she believed that he would not return? Made peace with it? He doesn't feel very warmly about that idea.

Then she smiles as she swiftly plucks the girl up onto her hip. "What do you have there? Did you steal Lord Reaver's cap? Naughty girl." She clucks her tongue while the child giggles. The smile turns toward him. "I hope that you didn't want that back," she says, nodding down at the hat, which the girl is attempting to put on her own, small head. "She's not one to concede a prize easily."

Reaver chuckles, thumbing the artfully trimmed line of his beard. "Well, I am fond of such a fine chapeau. But seeing as I'm behind a few nameday gifts to her Royal Highness, I suppose I could part with it."

Sparrow chuckles too, rocking the girl to stillness as she wriggles. "How generous." Swiping a stray curl or two back from her daughter's forehead she nods toward him. "What do you say, darling?"

Something that's close to a "thank you" is directed at him as the child continues to stuff her head into the mass of silk and feathers.

He bows to the girl deeply, eyes locked with her mother's. "You are most welcome, Princess."

The air changes as he stands back up; it's heavier as Sparrow continues to cradle the girl on her hip. Her teeth worry her lower lip before her tongue darts out to wet them. Finally, she says, "Welcome back. You've missed a few things in your absence."

"So I see," he says, glancing to the girl who appears to be finished ducking beneath the hat. She looks back at him with their shared blue eyes, an endless well of naïve inquisitiveness bobbing within.

When he looks back to Sparrow, something has crossed her face that borders upon pain. She is looking between he and the girl. Her lower lip is in the grasp of her teeth again, crimson from the pressure. There is a very telling sheen to her soft eyes and redness on her nose.

She wants to know where he has been. What exactly it is that has been so important that he had to abandon her for close to four years? Has he known about the girl? He sees all of these questions in Sparrow's eyes and more. He also sees her tamping them down as ruthlessly as he does the echoes of his dreams.

Never before however, has she turned from him, as if to tamp him down along with those questions.

"If you'll excuse us," she says, adjusting the girl's weight as she picks up her skirt, "the princess is due for a nap and there's a terrible amount of papers for me to look over before Court in the morning." Her tone is formal, as if he's one of the faceless nobles petitioning her in her throne room. It is the voice of a queen, perfect in its confidence. A slight trill of pride runs through Reaver along with surprise; she definitely learned such a thing from him. "Good day and again, welcome back to Albion, Lord Reaver."

Alarm rises in his chest as he watches her flee. He has done nothing to warrant being brushed aside. Certainly nothing to deserve the almost-despair he had spied before she spun away on her heel. Something akin to dread crawls up his gullet.

_Let her go._ Robin is whispering, down, down, deep in the dark well where he's been banished to. _She was safer when you weren't here. __**They**__ were safer when you weren't here. Tear asunder the world but leave her be._

As always though, Robin's good sense is too late and far, far too frail. Letting Sparrow go isn't an option. Reaver would not choose to even if it were in fact a choice. She belongs to him.

"Sparrow?" He doesn't use names. They're personal things, names. Even with her, there are restrictions upon intimacy. Saying her name is the closest that he can come to begging and she knows this.

That is why she turns.

Say nothing. Now Robin, he can beg. Release her.

Reaver ignores him, as always, and clears his throat. "I understand that Her Majesty has a busy schedule, but might a…private audience be possible in the near future? Say, the evening after tomorrow?"

They both know that said "private audience" will be in her rooms, against her sheets and he knows what she wants to say. He also knows that she knows what she should say. For a second or two, Robin is excited, believing that maybe, just maybe Sparrow will be strong enough to save the both of them while Reaver dismays for the same reason.

Just like him though, she is weak when it comes to this thing between them. She nods quickly, curtly, adjusts the child in her arms, and continues back toward her castle, as if no agreement had been made at all. Reaver isn't sure that he's satisfied with that, at least when, with the way that she goes, it almost as if Sparrow is running away from him.

**3.**

Fêtes can be grand affairs; if Reaver adores anything it's a party and even the "proper" ones that he hosts at Bower Lake have their charm. What they lack in excessive drinking and orgies they make up for in allowing him opportunity to flex for the nobility, so-to-speak, showing off his wealth, charm, and influence. They also come with the added benefit of at least three or four days of Sparrow being in his bed without interruption. Usually.

At the Summer Gala, they've already gone at it once, down in one of the alcoves just off of the ballroom, but that was merely a taste of everything he has in mind. Sparrow wore a red gown to the party tonight. A very pretty, almost scandalously cut red gown. It's always hard enough for him to keep his hands off of her under normal circumstances, it is nigh impossible when so much of her cleavage is in view and draped in red satin. By whatever powers be, he adores her in red and he has many plans for that dress and the body within it behind the closed doors of his boudoir.

They're almost there. They would have been arrived a good while ago, but they keep ducking into corners to kiss and grope like a pair of teenagers. Right now, he has her pressed against the wall a few yards away from his bedroom, as he devours the lovely curve of her neck.

"_By the light_," she whimpers, arching against him as he nips the space beneath her ear. Her quick hands slide up his chest; his vest and shirt were torn open down in the alcove. Reaver groans against her pulse as a lace-gloved thumb swipes over his nipple. His hands, which have been occupied with the curve of her bottom and the small of her back, grasp harder out of reflex, urging their already tight bodies closer. Her leg slides up over his hip and Reaver is certain that this coupling of the evening won't make it to the bed either.

He is correct. Just not in the way that he expected.

Over their heavy breathing and rustling fabric comes the sound of a throat being cleared. Reaver has to give Sparrow's valet credit, for a chap so small he can always get attention when required. Considering how close Reaver is to being inside of Sparrow however, he does not have the patience to admire anything about their interloper at this moment. Were Sparrow not present in fact, he would have fired his Dragonstomper.

Jasper knows this of course, and pointedly disregards the mortal peril snarling six feet away to see to his duties. "I beg your pardon, Your Majesty," he says, giving the appropriate bow. Sparrow doesn't push Reaver away but she's righted herself enough that he's no longer half holding her up against the wall, ready to fuck. She also continues to cling to him for balance, which placates him a bit.

"It's fine, Jasper," she tells her valet. Reaver makes a noise of disagreement at the back of his throat which Sparrow ignores. "What is it?"

"The princess is asking for yourself and the Princess-Consort, Your Majesty," he says. "Apparently the young mistress managed to sneak a dozen or so honey cakes away from this evening's party and has eaten every one of them."

"All of them?" Reaver asks the question without thinking. To be honest, he is almost impressed. Frilly as the girl's frippery was this evening he wouldn't suspect it capable of hiding so much.

Sparrow moans unhappily, pinching the bridge of her nose between her knuckles. "By Avo. Marcella and I both told the nannies to double check everything! They know how she is with sweets! And now of course, she's puking up puddles of cake." She pushes a hard hissing-breath out through her nose and shakes her head. "Does Marcella know?"

The valet nods. "She's already there, Your Majesty."

Sparrow snorts, fixing her skirts and collar. "And likely green herself. Excellent. Thank you, Jasper, really. I'm on my way."

Jasper nods at the dismissal and turns on his heel, taking his leave as quietly as his entrance. While he does, Sparrow sighs and looks up at Reaver.

He glowers, not caring a whit about how petulant he must appear to be. The evening's sexual congress has been derailed; petulance is the nicest thing that can be expected of him. "What exactly do you pay those fancy governesses for?"

Sparrow rolls her eyes. "Believe me; I'm beginning to wonder myself."

He hasn't released her yet and he doesn't want to. Reaver clenches his fingers in the folds of her bodice. "And your lovely wife can't handle this?"

Another snort. "Marcie handles sick about as well as you would handle a wrinkle on your handsome face." She taps his chin, a smirk playing on the corner of her red mouth. It takes all of Reaver's self-restraint not to crush that smirk with his kiss. She catches him off-guard before the impulse can be acted upon, with a quick press of her lips to the underside of his jaw. "Don't worry, I'll be back soon. Rosie just needs her tummy rubbed while she takes a tonic to calm it down and sleep. Maybe a story too, if she's fussy."

"You should fire your chief au pair," he says even as she steps away. "Or better yet, execute her as an example to the others."

That makes Sparrow laugh and she winks at him over her shoulder. "A bit unfair. Have you seen how bloody fast that girl is? It's almost as if she comes from special stock or something…"

Reaver can't help it, he laughs. That is something to consider, he supposes.

His amusement is short lived. Once Sparrow is gone he is only cold, alone, and sporting a painfully rigid line in his trousers. Briefly, Reaver considers finding someone else to relieve him of his "tensions." Perhaps arrange a scene for Sparrow to walk in on. That idea is dismissed quickly enough; she might not be as thrilled with idea as he would. Also he isn't entirely sure that he wants anyone else's hands on her, no matter how pretty they might be.

After some debate, he decides that if he's to wait this out, he'll do so with a fine restorative beverage. It's easier than hunting up a servant to fetch it; when Sparrow visits he bans all people that aren't hers from the wing that he shares with the royal family. It keeps him from shooting all of his staff once she's gone in an effort to contain certain idle gossip concerning the queen and himself. Whether or not that it might be more truth than gossip does not matter, all the more reason to gouge out prying eyes and snip wagging tongues.

Down one of the many hidden stairwells he goes, intent on the secret wine cellar only he knows about. It has a potent selection that Reaver has gathered over his many wide voyages. Some Southern Island fruit liqueur perhaps, to take away the edge off of his wait and pliable for Sparrow's return. His objective of the green and gold bottle with its syrupy contents are derailed however, when upon pushing the door open to the pantry, he finds two (very) young men in state of passionate disarray between the vegetable bin and the shelves stocked with flour, sugar, and the like. One of said young men is Logan.

"By Avo!" they spring apart like rabbits once they notice his presence, which takes a moment and the clearing of his throat. The other fellow, a stocky chap with untidy blond hair and a barrel of a chest, had been pressing the prince to the wall and buried his face at the juncture of Logan's throat and shoulder. Now he whirls about with wide eyes, still keeping Logan to the wall but differently. His body is a shield for his prince now; were he anyone else, Reaver might call it sweet. As he is indeed himself though, Reaver crosses his arms, smirks, and flags an eyebrow.

"I—Lord Reaver—Uh…" Logan stumbles over words while trying to catch his breath.

His companion fares little better.

"His Royal Highness tripped!" the blond fellow says. His voice has a pitch to it that suggests it isn't normal for him and his gray-green eyes are wide. Lying is not his forte, even if he can manage to grit out the words.

"What?" The disbelief that Logan levels upon the other boy is comical, but Reaver manages to abstain from cackling. For the moment.

The blond winces. "And…so did I?"

In the fifteen years that Logan has lived, Reaver does not think he has ever looked more his mother than he does at this exact moment in time, thoroughly hard-up, exasperated, and disappointed. Skorm's arse, this boy's life will be a bumpy one…

With any other pair caught Reaver would encourage them to go on about their business and include him. Blackmail would certainly enter in whether or not he was issued an invitation to the tryst. However, while Reaver is a man of very, very, very few scruples and almost no morality to speak of, he is not going to participate in a Ménage à trois with his son.

What he feels he must do though, is just as odd. At least for him.

"Young Master…?"

"Uh, Daniel," Logan's friend says only after Reaver has settled a pointed stare upon him. His swarthy skin is covered in patches of red, particularly his ears. "Daniel Silsbee, Lord Reaver."

A Silsbee? Interesting. As Reaver recalls the Silsbees are gaggle of old-blood conservatives who threw a fit when Sparrow took charge. Funny how their scion is apparently intent on canoodling with the prince that they attempted to decry as a bastard.

"Ah, very good." Reaver smiles and hopes that it sends a chill or two down the boy's backbone. By the pallor that blooms beneath his flush, he would say that he succeeded. "Young Master Silsbee, if you could please take a moment to peruse the kitchens, I would speak with the prince. Privately."

That barrel of a chest puffs out at once and he broadens his stance between Logan and Reaver. To the Silsbee boy's credit Reaver is very good at reading fear and lies in a person. The gesture is all defense, more than ever he is Logan's shield, so this tryst whatever it is, is no ploy that he has been finagled into by his squawking relatives. Adorable as that may be, Reaver hasn't the time for it.

Logan is prudent enough to see this. Before his little friend can protest himself into something painful, the prince lays a hand on his arm. Daniel looks up and over his shoulder, into Logan's face.

"It will be fine, Daniel," he tells him with a faint smile. "Go on."

The young Lord Silsbee's face softens and he nods. With a touch to Logan's wrist, he takes his leave but not before casting a dark look back at Reaver and muttering, "Better be." He slams the door shut to drive home his point.

"Rude," Reaver says as a box of something-or-another tumbles from the shelf closest to the pantry door. "But full of backbone I'll give him that." He centers his gaze back upon Logan. "Which, I suppose is all just part of the attraction."

In fifteen years, Reaver has not seen Sparrow's son blush. Logan doesn't blush; he simply gets an uncomfortable and grumpy look about him—not unlike his mother. At this very moment however, his whole face flushes pink and Reaver takes stock of the boy anew.

Fifteen. Fire and plague, the boy is that old, isn't he? Not a child anymore and not a man. Not yet, but if the purpling mark on Logan's neck and mussed clothes are any indication, that won't be distinction for much longer.

Why does that make him…almost sad?

Robin is awake. _Because we've missed everything._ The fool taunts like a child in a schoolyard. _We helped to make him but what else have we done? A lesson with a pistol years and years ago? Bah._

The argument must play across his face in some part because Logan now looks at him with a flicker of concern. "Lord Reaver?"

An impulse runs through him and before he can think it over, he is beckoning Logan into the passage. "Come with me. Be quick, I don't wish to keep your gallant suitor waiting long lest he do something foolish."

Logan hesitates but only for a moment. For whatever reason—which Reaver refuses to dwell on—the boy follows him through the narrow walkways between rooms. It's a mostly straight shot from the pantry to the pleasure chamber hidden behind his study. Reaver unlocks the door to it and steps inside turning the lights on while the boy watches.

It's not an overly sumptuous room, it was built specifically for a quick fuck after business arrangements have been struck in the study that it is adjacent to. It has a soft bed though, as well as all of the necessities for a rigorous, sanitary coupling.

"Condoms." He opens the top bedside drawer, making sure Logan sees them before he shuts it. "Lubricant." The second drawer is opened and closed in the same manner as the first. "Use them both, particularly the second in excess. I assume that fancy school that Her Majesty sends you to has gone over the finer biological points of the act you and your little chum were getting close to back there? Preparation and all of that?"

Logan is so red right now that Reaver half expects blood to come shooting out of his nose. He stares down at the tops of his boots. "Yes, Lord Reaver. I—we know about…that aspect."

Sex has never been an awkward topic for Reaver. As much of it as he's had over the many, many, many years that he has been around, there has never been an act, position, or query in regards to intercourse that has ever made him remotely uneasy. And he would not call himself uneasy now, simply…ill-prepared.

Again, he refuses to dwell and pulls the key that unlocks this room and the study in front of it from the ring on his belt, proffering it to Logan. The boy accepts, a curious gleam to his dark eyes.

"Good, here," he says. "You can remember the way back from the cupboard, yes?"

Logan stares at the key a moment but then nods.

"Very good. Bring your beau here, then," he tells him. "Lock the door behind you, do whatever it is you two wish, and return the key to me sometime tomorrow."

Another nod and Logan looks smaller than he is. Which should be incredibly hard because they're quite close to being the same height.

Avo, Skorm, or whatever lies beyond, when did _that_ happen?

The boy shifts about in disquiet. There are words, questions, fears humming by the thousands behind those eyes that are far too much like his mother's and Reaver is at a loss for what to do when they turn upon him, begging for assistance without words. He has nothing.

Robin, though, that imp finally has something that is not ash in his hands and he wheedles between the bars of his cage, slinking to the root of Reaver's tongue and arm.

Reaver is not sure who is surprised more by the hand that he lays like a feather on Logan's shoulder, himself or the boy. More astonishing is that neither of them jerk away the second that they realize the contact.

"You are a prince," Robin tells Logan with Reaver's voice. "You will be a king. Carry yourself with the authority that you were born with. Whether you want to share this night and certain moments with that handsome young man back there or whether you would kiss his cheek and then retire to bed alone is all within your control. And neither decision is a faulty one."

Something very close to a smile curls upon Logan's mouth. "You make it sound easy."

Reaver chuckles, pulling his hand away to clasp at the small of his back, lest Robin gives into the itch and ruffles the lad's hair. Such a thing would be too familiar and worse, too tacky. "You are young, Your Royal Highness. These sorts of things should be easy. Everything ahead is a dreadful sight more boring, I assure you." Before he can stop himself he adds, "Fucking in a pantry for example, is something you should hold off on doing until you're old and bored and you know enough tricks to ensure you won't trip over a potato and suffer serious injury."

A laugh this time, it is brief and low, but earnest. Tension rolls from Logan's lanky frame, making the very air of the room brighter. And it makes Reaver feel…something. Relief perhaps, mixed with a touch of pride and even affection. Perhaps his blood is still addled from the earlier encounter with Sparrow, or maybe the wine at the party was stronger than he thought that he ordered. He can't fathom another reason for what he asks next.

"He's a good fellow, this Silsbee boy?" He nods vaguely in the direction of the kitchens where the other lad is surely waiting with baited breath. Avo, the irony of that question falling from his lips.

If the thought crosses Logan's mind as well, it's pushed aside; he's blushing again. Though this bout comes with a faint smile. "He is. He's…my best friend."

_Robin cannot stop grinning. His face feels as if it will be forever split like this. He does not care either, not with the events of this night. In fact he can scarce imagine ever being unhappy again. Against his chest, Oriole hums in agreement._

"_So I guess all the gossip was right," she says, voice muffled against his skin. Her lips brush his collarbone, sending the warmest shivers down his spine. "That was just about the most fun thing we've ever done."_

_A twinge goes through his gut, prickly disquiet that threatens the serenity of the moment. "You…You're sure you're all right?" His hands were stroking up her back and through her hair idly before, now they curl and grasp. His throat clenches. "They say for girls that it's…That it might…" The very idea that he could cause her harm by any means is intolerable to him._

_Oriole is aware of this too. With a sigh, as if his concern were childish she rolls up, knocking back the worn quilt that they had covered their naked bodies in post-coital bliss. On her hands and knees she hovers above him._

"_Do I look to be anything less than pleased?" she demands, right eyebrow cocked high._

_The weight in his chest lifts as he stares up at Oriole. Behind her, in the blackish-blue, summer sky that's been set aflame with a few hundred-thousand stars, the moon halos her head almost perfectly. He can make out every detail of her pretty face in such brilliant darkness, the right corner of her mouth is curled in a smirk but her eyes are soft and there can be no mistaking the adoration that overflows from them._

"_You look like a goddess." Syrupy drivel, that's what he would normally call such a sentiment. Pretty but useless. But they escape him before he can think to bite down on his tongue. Also, there is no hollowness to those words; Robin means every syllable. He venerates Oriole with every single breath, that has been a constant fact for all sixteen years of his life, and as trite as voicing it might sound, there can be no taking back the truth._

_He waits for her to laugh and jab him. Robin's heart beats wildly, fearful of her scorn. A fool worry. In a blink, her body is pressed against his once more, mouth hot and hungry and searching. He returns the kiss with equal vigor until all of the breath is lost from his lungs and they're both a gasping mess clutching at one another under the stars._

"_I asked Dahlia and Bunny about it," she tells him after they've cooled down a bit. "They said hurting or bleeding when you lose your virginity was a shovel-full of horseshit. That it would only happen if I wasn't wet." She nips at his pulse-point and giggles. Taking hold of his wrist as he cards her hair, she brings Robin's hand before her face. "Considering what good work these clever things usually do, I didn't worry." And she brushes her lips to his knuckles._

_A blush creeps up Robin's neck but it doesn't impede his ever-widening grin. "You trust me that much, do you?"_

_She sticks her tongue out then kisses his nose. "You're the love of my life and—more importantly—my best friend, what wouldn't I trust you with?"_

"_Cooking," he says without a pause. Oriole laughs outright, the sound ringing out through the darkness like silver chimes. "Anything with a hammer. Or—" His jokes are silenced with a kiss._

"Lord Reaver?" Logan's voice jerks him away from the reverie of Robin's pathetic life. He shakes it off and puts a smile in place for the prince. As good as he is at masking himself, it's probably very reassuring.

Why does he sincerely hope that that is true?

"Well, he'll understand your decision no matter what it might be then," Reaver says. He nods toward the passage, the strangest itch to run eating at the muscles in his legs. He doesn't give into it, not completely. He does go past Logan, walking ahead without pause for the prince. At least until Logan speaks.

"This…This isn't a topic of discussion that you'll bring up with my mother, is it?" the boy asks when they're about halfway back to the pantry.

Reaver can't suppress a derisive snort. "Only if Your Royal Highness would like me to bring the matter of his virginity to Her Majesty's attention."

His back is to Logan so he can't rightly see the lad but he can feel the trill of horror running down his companion's spine. "Um. No. That's quite all right. Thank you, Lord Reaver."

He waves the words away. "Think nothing of it, Your Royal Highness." And surprisingly, he means that.

They part ways in the pantry, Reaver does not stay to slake his curiosities about how Logan's evening will end; that is the business of the two boys and no one else. He continues onto his private wine cellar taking his sweet time in selecting the evening's poison (he opts for the fruit liqueur as previously intended), and when he returns to the intersection where he'd come across the would-be lovers, he finds it deserted. Both the pantry and passage doors are shut.

Upon his return upstairs, he finds a curious compulsion leading his feet off course from his bedroom. His wayward path ends at the wing's opposite end, in the temporary Royal quarters, at the threshold of the princess' room. The nannies are nowhere to be seen, which given what use that they seem to be is probably all for the better, and neither is the Princess-Consort. There are only two figures in the room assigned to the princess, and that is the princess herself along with her mother. In the bed, Rosie is curled into Sparrow's side, eyes closed and face a still a bit green, but she otherwise appears to have found peaceful slumber. Sparrow seems similarly inclined, there's an open storybook in her lap as she continues to pet Rosie's curls, but her eyes are drooping without a doubt.

Sleepy or not, she still notices him when he leans against the doorframe. A half-smile is sent in his direction.

"Worried that I'd forgotten you?" she asks, voice almost inaudible. To anyone without Hero senses he doesn't doubt that it would be.

The urge to tell her that he had in fact not been worried at all because he was too preoccupied with assisting their teenage son in losing his virginity is nigh impossible. Somehow though, Reaver manages and instead smirks as he nods to Rosie.

"Her Highness appears to be fast asleep." He keeps his voice low only to avoid further interruptions. It has nothing to do with that soft, round face with Sparrow's midnight curls and his bright eyes sleeping so serenely at her side. Not one single thing.

Padding across the room in complete silence, he extends a hand to Sparrow. She rolls her eyes but nods, beginning the tedious process of extracting herself from the girl's grasp. For Reaver it is a process that runs far too slow and the second after Sparrow's lips have touched the crown of Rosie's head, he scoops her up into his arms. Sparrow only barely swallows back a very indignant squawk. Her glare is full of fire but the strength of it is meager compared to the force of the kiss that he steals.

"Impatient ass," Sparrow hisses, mouth still slanted to his. In all fairness she isn't wrong. She does not struggle as he goes about carrying her back to his rooms though.

The next day, Reaver's key is returned by the prince's valet along with a letter asking if he would consider coming to Brightwall on occasion to teach marksmanship. He acquiesces to it along with the lad's subsequent request to keep their lessons out of Sparrow's periphery. Because, as he tells himself, it is always a good idea to be in the favorable graces of his future monarch.

It's harder to excuse the pony that he buys on a whim for the girl as such. Or the close eye that he ensures the young Lord Silsbee knows is kept upon him. But Reaver does not dwell on mundane things and Robin is easy enough to drown out.

Most of the time.

**4.**

"Why is Mummy sad?"

The girl is quick and that, Reaver supposes, is his fault. Most of the time it pleases him to see her darting underfoot, startling unwary courtiers. He especially enjoys hearing how she takes her nannies, Mother, and Foster-Mother by surprise. Like when she manages to sneak twenty frogs into her rooms. That was a delightful tale, if he does say so himself.

Less amusing for him is her appearing practically out of nowhere while he's minding his own business in a corridor and latching onto his mulberry-silk jacket sleeve. With little fingers he does not trust to be anything other than sticky with the aforementioned frog incident taken into consideration.

Ruined fabric is only funny when it happens to other people after all.

His first inclination is to shake her off. No, his first inclination for anyone grasping at him without permission is to put a bullet between their eyes and kick their corpse.

With Rosie, just like her brother however, something in Reaver—or _someone_—dampens all of his usual instincts.

He tells himself that it's because he does not want to deal with Sparrow and her axe. It has nothing to do with those enormous blue eyes that share every line and lash of his own, including a the faint green freckle in the left iris.

He does still have to dislodge her fingers to keep his sanity. With a smile, of course.

"Whatever do you mean, _ma princesse_?" he asks, distracting her with a tug to the end of her braid.

The look that Rosie levels up at him nearly makes him laugh; a six-year-old should not be so adept at a deadpanning. Well, unless Logan is to be counted, but the boy has always favored his mother so that goes without saying.

She crosses her arms, chin jutted out, all business. Give her a few years and she'll be rendering waves of grown men to their knees with that pretty face and the ire sparkling in her eyes. "Mummy's been gloomy all week, since the last time you visited."

If Reaver were a man with shame—he isn't—or a sense of propriety—definitely not—he would probably choke and turn scarlet. The last time he visited Sparrow he had nearly broken that big (and thankfully sturdy) desk in her office. Amoral as he may be, he doesn't want the girl to have heard or seen anything in relation to _that_.

"And how did you know that I visited?" he asks. "I believe I stopped in for a discussion with Her Majesty whilst you and your brother were out?"

Rosie has the audacity to roll her eyes and he has will just strong enough not to laugh. If her eye-color wasn't a dead giveaway on where she came from then her attitude would do it.

"I saw you leaving," she tells him, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "I was bringing her cocoa and pudding; Walter even let me carry them by myself."

A moment or two blinks. He can't decide which point of this conversation is more comical that a little girl is interrogating him or that for once, _he_ is not actually at fault.

_Yes you are_, Robin whispers. _They wouldn't have fought if not for you…_

He swallows down a growl. Ridiculous. It isn't _his _fault that Hammer or Hannah or whatever that lumbering lout was calling herself this days, is so ill-bred as to pop in without warning. Nor is it his fault that she had to quarrel with Sparrow about what she walked in on as if it were any of her business.

Robin remains unconvinced and will not allow the image of Sparrow weeping in the row's aftermath to fade.

"Why is she sad?" Those tiny, quick hands have found the expensive linen of his breeches now. Their grip is harder, more insistent than before and he doubts extricating himself from it will be so simple this time around. A split second passes in which he considers throwing her off and running but Reaver isn't sure that she wouldn't be clutching at him again just as soon as he turned his heel.

Speedy chit.

The softness of her eyes and trembling lower lip have no bearing in the matter. None.

Reaver sucks at his teeth as he kneels down to meet the girl at her level. It takes a bit of stooping but on the plus side it gets her clinging to cease. It's only once he's down and locked in that expectant stare that he realizes that he has _no_ idea how to answer her.

"Your mother…" It's been a very, very, _very_ long time since he has been at a loss for words. At another time he might be amused by the novelty of it.

There is no way to tell her the truth; he isn't even tempted to. Something in Reaver's chest, something that does not wholly resonate from the wretched wisp of Robin, turns black at the memory of Hammer's face when she had realized just who the father of Sparrow's children was. The disdain toward him he couldn't care a whit about; Hammer is and always has been a brute with one use. With that use fulfilled he would consider her obsolete, less than a footnote in the annals of everything important i.e. _his _preferences.

And yet her snap decision that Logan and Rose were now "wrong" sticks with him, uglier and more rotten than the stench of a Kraken in a storm.

He should find out where that bloody temple she's holed up in is and raze it. Or better yet, _buy_ it, leech her order dry with rent, and then raze it. And the village around it. No, that would leave too much to chance. Better to just burn down the whole countryside. Oh, that would needle her big, self-righteous craw…

Later. The girl needs an answer and her impatience has her fisting the collar of his jacket. Honestly, how as Sparrow allowed this child to learn such disregard for fine clothing? How has _he_ allowed it?

"Your mother…has many things on her mind." Reaver has never experienced such difficulty in lying before. Those mirror-image eyes and their expectant light make him feel chaffed, raw, and very nearly exposed. It prickles every nerve ending and yet he cannot find it in him to despise her.

"What things?" Rosie demands.

_The fact that her supposed best friend could not graciously accept the fact that I sired you. Or that your mother is human being and not a cause, with desires, needs, and a breaking point._

Reaver does not say any of this aloud of course. It takes some tongue biting not to, but he manages to swallow back the vitriolic truth of things. Instead he offers the explanation of, "Grown-up things," along with a blithe smile.

Rosie crosses her arms again, face puckering. "That's what everyone who _is _a grown-up says when they don't want to tell the truth."

He chuckles, genuinely charmed by her frustration and the way it wrinkles up her nose. "Is it? Well, I assure Your Highness, that the truth is the last thing I'd ever want to hide from you. Truly."

A single eyebrow flags high and Reaver is thankful they're alone in right now; there would be no denying to common riffraff that he'd fathered the girl if they weren't. Not with her distilling his own bullshit-face with such incredible precision. There's no stopping another trickle of laughter from escaping though.

Rosie is less entertained. Her little booted foot stamps the floor and her chin goes out again. "Fine be that way. How are you going to make her not sad anymore?"

Now that takes him aback. "I beg your pardon?"

He gets another roll of her eyes. "What are you going to do to cheer her up?" she asks bold as brass, as if he were the child and she the adult in the hall. "You're her friend, aren't you? Why else would you come by unless it's to see her?"

The laughable matter of Rosie labeling him as Sparrow's "friend" aside, she's got him. Court isn't being held today, he has no proposals that require royal attention, and there certainly isn't an emergency on hand. Not unless crimes of fashion that abound around the Winter Holidays are to count, but wretched as those are, they're hardly a reason for him to be about. Sparrow had turned down his proposal on fining the nobility for prancing about in garish ensembles the first year of her rule anyway.

Why _is_ he here?

Robin is quick to answer. _You know why, coward._

While Reaver is debating on whether or not he could possibly carve that foul little voice out with a rusty knife, Rosie has lost her patience with him again and is now pulling at him with all of her might. It takes him aback for a moment, knocking him out of his thoughts because aside from being damnably persistent, the girl is _strong_. She can't budge him much, but a child of six shouldn't be able to budge him at all.

It's a good thing that she has such a sweet disposition; the other children around this place would not survive her otherwise.

"Come on!" she whines, continuing to tug at his gloved hand.

"I beg your pardon, Your Highness, but what is it I am to 'come on' about?" he asks it even as he stands and allows her to lead.

"I'm helping you," she says. "This way!"

Again, it crosses Reaver's mind that if this child were not made of sunshine, she would utterly destroy everything in her path. The giggling little imp is like quicksilver and while it is no trouble at all for him to keep pace with her, he cannot imagine how her caretakers with their very un-Hero blood manage day to day.

Hmm…perhaps that's why Sparrow has a team of nannies. He's always wondered about that, perhaps they take shifts so that exhaustion doesn't kill them. That shouldn't make him so…sort of proud, should it?

No. It should. It definitely should.

For a moment Reaver thinks to ask her where they're going as she leads him along empty corridors and stairwells through parts of the castle he's not traveled before. He refrains though, surprises are much more interesting and somewhat of a novelty to him anymore.

The girl doesn't disappoint, he'll say that much. When their journey finally comes to its end, they're standing at the large, glass and brass doors that lead to the palace greenhouse. He cocks an eyebrow down at her but Rosie pays him no mind at all, marching up to the large doors and putting all of her meager weight into wrenching the right handle down until it clicks and swings open.

Rosie has done this before, he realizes as the warm, heady, perfumed of the air within wafts out and caresses his face. Reaver wonders if Sparrow knows just how agile the girl is. He recalls the way that she looked back in late summer, at the ball in Logan's honor; the ardent way that she protested either the boy or the girl being marked as Heroes. She has to know in her bones though, Sparrow is many things but not naïve. She _can_ be stubborn though, and prone to tunnel-vision, he remembers that from the days when Lucien was mucking about.

Why does _her_ refusal to see the truth make something curl in _his_ stomach though?

"Well, don't just stand there, silly!" the girl blots out the reply gathering from Robin's wispy, formless mouth. Reaver blinks and she's across the room, climbing one of many very pretty—but not all that sturdy looking—trellises. She climbs just as fast as she runs, unimpeded by her ruffled skirts and pretty shoes, and something in his chest lurches when she leaps from the first ivy laden frame to another.

He almost orders her to be careful, worse, to come down this instant. Instead he follows her along, hovering beneath where she's chosen to dangle (Sparrow will murder him if she falls, he has no doubt) and says, "I do hate to appear such a dunce before you, Your Highness, but what exactly brings us to this lovely place?"

Rosie stops at once, whirling about on the precarious lattice that she stands upon. He readies himself to catch her—Skorm and Avo she is _so small_, her head would crack like an egg!—and only receives her glare, from where she remains, perfectly balanced on the tips of her toes. Her hands are on her hips, brow pinched, and in this moment she is every tiny inch her mother.

"Flowers!" she says that one word if it were summary answer to all of the woes in the world _and_ as if he had the brain of a tortoise.

Why does that make him even more fond of her? That's not normal.

"Flowers?" he repeats.

"To make her feel better!" Rosie all but shouts. In a blink she's hanging upside down from the bower, her little knees wrapped over and through a wrought iron bar. They are at eye-level when she does that, albeit her eyes are upside down. Her arms cross as she continues to look at him like he were a fool. "You're not very good at being a friend."

From the mouth of babes…

Truer words, Reaver knows, have probably never been spoken about him with only the cursory knowledge that the girl has. Certainly they've never been spoken to his face and met with laughter rather than the roar of his Dragonstomper. Sparrow excluded, of course.

"No, _ma princesse_," he says, still chuckling. "No. I do not believe that I am."

The girl's eyes soften when he says that, going all wide and bright. Reaver loathes that look that pity in her familiar eyes, like he's a lamb with a bad leg and not a wolf whose teeth shine prettily to distract from their edges. Pity and sympathy shouldn't be felt for him by anyone, least of all Rosie. She should hate him. She would be safest if she hated him and kept her distance.

_They all would._

For once, he is about to obey the vile ghost forever prowling at the back of his mind. He will leave and give this girl, her brother, and her mother the best gift he could give them; a life devoid of him. One that he can taint no further, he'll rule from his dark underbelly throne, just as he did before and they will flourish in the light. That would be best for all of them.

And then the girl has swung herself down from the trellis and taken his hand again. Only this time, she isn't tugging and before Reaver can recoil and storm away, he makes the mistake of looking down. She still wearing that sad, commiserative look but that isn't what freezes him.

Her hands are tiny. So tiny. Both of them could fit easily within his palm, swallowed up by the embossed, black kidskin of his gloves. And yet, when they curl around his fingers and thumb, there is nothing small in her grip, no frailty, not even a waiver. This child is full of steel and fire, and doe-eyed, sweet, and little though she may be, she is also fierce.

More importantly she is his. Whether or not it is spoken out loud, his blood in part pumps through her body, just as with Logan. Reaver has never been one to willingly give up anything that he held claim to, he will not start now, no matter how better off all of them might be in the end for it, himself included.

"That's all right," she pats the back of his hand. "I'll help you." She does not wait for him to respond, keeping a tight hold upon his ring and little fingers as she points out various blooms. "Honeysuckle and jasmine are Mummy's favorites because of how they smell. She likes red too but never roses. They make her sad. Logan says it's because of Auntie Rose, you know, who I'm named for."

The girl chatters on and Reaver lets her, following her directions on what to gather. She has keen eye for arrangement, he notices, as she sorts the crimson Amaryllis, white jasmine, and honeysuckle he acquires. That's credit to his blood too, he decides. If Marcella were not around to keep things in line he has no doubt that Sparrow would forever be traipsing about in a soldier's kit and mounting Hobbe heads on the walls.

Ugh. Intelligent, powerful, and beautiful the mother of his children may be, but her decorating sense is the stuff of nightmares…

"There," Rosie says after everything has been organized to her satisfaction. She pulls one of the ribbons from her hair tying a sloppy bow to keep the flowers set and then holds them out to him. "Mummy will love it."

Kneeling beside her as she works, Reaver chuckles as he accepts the bouquet. "I have no doubt of your considerable expertise, Your Highness."

She preens like him too, though with a touch less smugness. "Good." And then she surprises him yet again by snapping off a nearby spray of blood-red Sweet William and placing them in the empty buttonhole of his lapel before he can pull back. Rosie grins. "She likes those too."

He's about to ask why that would matter at all but the girl is tugging at him again, urging him back the way that they came toward her mother's study.

They come across Sparrow before returning to the royal wing. She's outside of the throne room, speaking to her little soldiers, the general and the one with the overcompensating moustache. The air of business-as-usual is upheld, she would never show her people anything less but Reaver can see it, the delicate slouch of her shoulders, the melancholy that she guards in her eyes. She's raw and aching from the encounter with Hammer yet still and Reaver can feel it a hundred yards away. That's why he stops them.

The girl looks up at him with an incredulous stare. "What is it? She's right there. Aren't you—"

Reaver is not good, not kind, he is not human in anything but flesh anymore, if even that. He does not love Sparrow as Robin loved Oriole, does not adore his children as Robin would have. Such aptitude was bludgeoned and buried with the fool bird who went singing his pathetic woes to the darkness. What Reaver can do though, is guard what belongs to him, that much he excels at.

Which is why he tells Rosie, "You take them to her, Your Highness."

Her nose wrinkles. "But, you're—"

"Not someone who can lift her spirits," he says. At the continued furrowed brow he explains, "I was being honest when I said _I_ was not the one who upset your mother, dear girl. And I'm being honest now when I say she would rather take that pretty bouquet from someone that she loves than a dashing rogue."

The girl continues to stare up at him, though her glare has turned more to just a sharp start and her face is unrumpled.

"This is a Grown-Up thing, isn't it?" she finally says.

Reaver laughs. "Of course not," he tells her, taking a knee. He grins and tugs the end of her braid again as he leans in just enough so that their eyes are at equal height. "But you are a clever enough girl to know bullshit when it is set so plainly in front of you."

Rosie snorts a laugh and her smile mirrors his as they crouch there for a moment, like conspirators in some grand scheme. He supposes that they are, in a way, and something that is almost like…_respect_ washes over him. Which is ludicrous because the only person that Reaver respects is himself.

She places a kiss to his cheek while he's distracted by that thought. It's quick and his reflexes are superior enough that he could move or intercept her if he really wanted to. He doesn't though, off-putting as her affection initially strikes him, Reaver also can't deny he is charmed in his own way.

Also she her face is very clean. Princess of the realm, his flesh and blood, or not, if there was snot or spittle on her tiny face he would throw her across the room before allowing her face anywhere near his.

Not a second later, she's turned on her heel and dashing down the hallway. Reaver follows her example in the opposite direction. Sparrow will be fine, he's certain. A woman as sentimental as she is, the second Rosie puts those flowers in her arms, the regret and ache Hammer left will begin melting. She will remember that she has two beautiful children whom she loves more than anything in the world, who in return worship the ground she walks upon.

Reaver will return to his manse and press the Sweet William in his buttonhole between the pages of the first letter he received from Logan, the one asking him for shooting lessons. Those will be locked away in a magical vault and he will proceed to drown out Robin's screeching with liquor, opiates, and pretty faces.

And they will both muddle along as they always do.

**5.**

After Sparrow splits Lillian Lion-Bane's head from her shoulders, effectively cauterizing the Ravenscar Rebellion, they spend a week or two cleaning up stragglers. While he dislikes the company of soldiers, it's a jolly enough time for him; Sparrow isn't much in the mood for clemency so he gets to shoot as many of the upstart rebels on sight as he pleases. She also lets him have his pick of a few of the reclaimed ships. Most importantly though, they're sharing a bed again for the first time since the little incident in Brightwall and sleep comes to him better than it ever has before.

Mostly. Going on three hundred years has had odd patterns develop for him, so there are a few nights, like this one, where in spite of the delicious exhaustion and dreamless sleep her presence has brought to his bed, Reaver's eyes still open long before the sun is up.

He is motionless for a few moments, blinking at the ceiling of his cabin and the mauve velvet curtains that hang around the bed. He closes eyes in hopes that this is just an off-chance awakening and that sleep will reclaim him if he only pretends that he's still tired. No such luck, but it was worth the try.

Against his chest, Sparrow sighs in her sleep but is otherwise unperturbed. Reaver is almost envious of her; she always sleeps so sound. She has that keen Hero sense of danger of course, but unless something nefarious sends that off, her dreams never seem to have any interruption.

Well, it is not _always_ dull, is perhaps the better description, what with the fact that she continues to let a creature such as he slip into bed with her and time again. But he wouldn't have her smarten up and change that. No, no, no. There isn't a chance of letting phenomenal sex like the kind that they have or the sound sleep that (almost) always follows it slip through his fingers.

He studies her slumbering form. Sparrow is wrapped around him, one leg still over his hip and left arm beneath his with its fingers curled against the skin just beneath his shoulder-blade. With her head tucked beneath his chin, her breath puffs against his neck and though the scent of it isn't exactly perfume, the urge to push her away never comes. In fact he clings right back, pulling her body tighter against his with the arm draped about her middle and carding his other hand deep into her ebony hair.

Nearly forty years this tryst between them has been going on and in those many years she hasn't had so much as a gray hair or a wrinkle. No dark bargains required. Sparrow was made for him, just as Oriole had been made for Robin. They are a match set, just carved from darker, harder substances.

He could keep her like this forever, he realizes, as looks down at her so defenseless in his embrace. He curls and uncurls his fingers through the silky black tendrils of her hair, pushing it away from her lovely face. If Reaver only had a whim, if he only pushed just enough, he could keep her all to himself forever. She hates the crown and its insufferable weight; how much convincing would she really need to abandon it all? She stays now only because of that ever-tenuous thread called "duty" that she cannot seem to just snip. And the children.

Reaver's blood begins to race along with these half-mad thoughts in his head. He pulls Sparrow closer, stroking along down her spine, along the curve of her bottom and the back of her thigh. She sighs and he can feel her own pulse jump, just a hair, but she does not waken.

The children will not be children forever. Logan actually has become a man in these last few years, fine and capable; give one or two years more and he will be ready to assume the throne. And Rosie? Hah. Now that one is downright formidable and all she has to do is smile. Reaver has no doubt that if the girl were stranded on a foreign continent, she would have the run of it within a day simply by batting her eyes. Hell, he doesn't doubt that she could defeat a Kraken with her charm.

Rosie and Logan won't need a mother looking after them much longer, he knows, if they even do now. And it isn't like watch couldn't be kept from a distance; that's what he has always done, after all. More of that might even do them all good; he would be kept at bay, unable to muss or taint anything with his selfish impulses even by accident, and Sparrow could perhaps come to see that her methods of sheltering weren't _always _for the best.

Yes just a few more years, then she'll want to leave. When she notices that the boy and girl are aging, that they aren't the same as the two of them, that their flesh is fragile with mortality. She will not be able to bear the sight of them fading. Neither will she be able to stand by and watch as Marcella, Jasper, and all of her other lapdogs turn to naught but dust on bones. Reaver will barely have to offer; she will not want to be the last and truly alone.

_Neither do you_.

Reaver swallows against the urge to bite back at Robin and instead dips his head forward, to the hollow of Sparrow's neck. He noses the space where her throat meets her shoulder, breathing in the scent of her. It's beautiful, familiar, and tinged with the scent of their sex. He wants this scent at his beck and call for the rest of his very long life. Wants her in his bed, shielding his dreams, wrapped around him and filled with him. And he will have it, the moment he can find the opening to leverage, he _will_ have it. He must.

"Reaver?" Sparrow's sleep-drunk voice interrupts his fevered thoughts. Perhaps he's gripped her too hard, or moved her too much, or maybe it was just the feel of his breath against her neck. In any case, she is awake.

He tilts his head, just enough to meet her stare which is heavily glazed with drowsiness. Still, she's not so lethargic yet that she cannot sense disquiet in him. She doesn't ask him if something is wrong even as she worries her lower lip between her teeth and flags a single brow down at him. He doesn't allow her the chance to either.

He kisses up the column of her throat, stopping just shy of the spot beneath her ear that drives her to madness. He goes slow, waiting for her to push him away, to tell him to stop and go back to sleep, any signal that would belay she does not want to continue. What she does is mewl and coil the leg already splayed over his hip higher, arching into him.

They move seamlessly together, like honeyed-wine as it is poured, maneuvering until Sparrow's back is against the sheets and he hovers above, carrying his weight but pressing so close that breath can barely be taken. Both of her legs encircle his waist, locking him in place as if there were anywhere else he could ever prefer to be. The fingers that rested beneath his shoulder now dig in, her short nails adding an exquisite sting.

Made for each other. They have to be. Nothing else could suffice as an acceptable definition of what Sparrow is for Reaver, not when all he has to do is rock his hips just so and he is sliding into her. In unison they cry out as he slowly hilts. When he is as deep as he can possibly go, when he has given everything, Reaver rests his forehead to hers. They breathe, nose to nose, mouth to mouth, and Sparrow steals the air from his lungs giving him fire in return.

The pace is languorous, not to torture but to feel and to show. He doesn't need to tease or play to make her unravel, the body beneath him belongs just as much to him as it does her. She knows this too and in the guarded bubble of this moment, she makes no stubborn attempts to pretend otherwise. All she does is grasp him more tightly, her right hand mirroring his to rake through his hair and cup his cheek.

It is not rare for him to meet a lover's eyes while they are in the act. Reaver's ego is always well stoked by seeing his own reflection, particularly while his name is being cooed breathlessly while pleasure builds. Pride is not the right word for what overtakes him when he locks gaze with Sparrow and finds those big brown eyes are filled with him and only him. It is more, it is possession _and_ completion, and the addiction that he has for it should be terrifying. It _is_ terrifying, but desire outweighs good sense, as almost every decision in his life (lives) has, so he only holds her tighter and fucks more determinedly.

His. His and his alone. That is the mantra chanted in his bones even after he has brought her release and found his own. It goes through him like a drumbeat, just beneath the pounding of his heart when he falls asleep still inside of and wrapped around her. He just has to wait, to be patient for her to see it too. Reaver hasn't much patience but for Sparrow he can scrounge up an infinity.

Because that is what they will have in the end.

**6.**

"We need to speak."

There are better ways perhaps, to go about this, than sneaking into the Royal Chambers. Sparrow's nature is a forgiving one, more often than not and Reaver knows that she loves him. Unwillingly and unwittingly perhaps, but her heart has been in his hands for a very long time. He feels it there now, though the beat is dulled, as if in a vault with no key; still in his clutches but inaccessible. Given enough time, he could find a way to pick that lock, he knows that he could.

But he cannot wait. These last few weeks since the incident in the Spire has seen Reaver maddened by nightmares and lack of sleep and a needto see her so intense that his chest feels as if it were banded by a leaden cinch. It burns in his blood hotter than any craving that he has had before.

He can fix this. Explain it. _Lie_. Whatever he has to do to make her see he will do and he knows that he can_—if only they speak_!

He had not expected this battle to be an easy one, in fact he knew it was going to be the opposite. And yet when Sparrow whirls about from her map table with lightening on her fingers and hellfire in her eyes, something in him lurches. Something deep and sharp; it shudders his pulse and if he were not the prime specimen he were, it might just knock him back.

"Get. Out." The words are spit at him like the bite of an asp but a hundred times more potent. A snake's venom Reaver is sure that he could survive. Sparrow didn't give him that certainty when they were on amicable terms, let alone when death is on her tongue.

He does not balk however. There is no room to retreat. Not when he's come so far, scaling walls and creeping through shadows in the dark of night like some common burglar.

She will listen to him. She must. She always has.

"I will be happy to oblige your request, Your Majesty, once we have spoken," he says, one hand on his Dragonstomper. He doesn't want to shoot her, that is the very last thing that he wants in fact. But if that lightning in her hand strikes toward him, he can't just stand around. Besides, he won't need to kill her, just clip her knee or an arm, just something small to slow her down.

The cold, frightening rage on her face only intensifies. She gestures toward her door with a crackling hand. "_Now_."

"No."

Reaver waits for her to sling a spell at him. For the blistering heat that charges in her palm to whip in his direction. Sparrow might not be a true sorceress but she is not unskilled with her magic.

She surprises him. Lightning is thrown not at him but behind him. It still close enough that instinct sends him leaping to the side. The same side that Sparrow is flinging her map table at. He dodges—what kind of incarnation of speed and skill would he be if he didn't?—and finds another surprise once he has regained his bearing: she is bolting from the room.

Something seizes up in his chest as she runs from him, dark hair flying behind her. When has she run from him? Not since…

"_What did you do?!" Oriole demands amidst the unearthly cries rising up from the town. Grabbing fistfuls of Robin's shirt she yanks him down to her level. Her eyes blaze with terror, hurt, and anger. She has never looked at him like this before. She shakes him. "Dammit, Rob, __**what did you do**__?"_

_His tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth, sandpaper upon cotton. He cannot tell her, cannot say the words, cannot admit out loud the sin of betrayal he has committed this night._

_All that comes out is a pathetic, tremulous, "I'm sorry."_

_Those two dismal words are far worse than any confession or lie that he could have laid before her. His apology only contorts her features all the more. Worst of all they bring tears to her eyes as realization sets in. She knows what he has done. Perhaps not the shape but enough to see that the bloody outcome._

_It breaks him and he reaches for her. "Love—"_

_She shoves him back. "Don't touch me!" Oriole screams. "Monster! Vain, selfish vulture!"_

_He would have preferred her to strike him. He would have preferred death. Anything but what he sees in her eyes—a reflection of himself that is so grotesque so evil so…__**unwanted**__. Robin has only ever truly liked himself in Oriole's eyes and he has now shattered them._

_He sinks to his knees as she turns, hefting her axe and sprinting toward the village. Her black hair flies behind her and all Robin can think is that the Shadows cannot keep their bargain now. Disease and old age cannot come to a man who is already dead._

Reaver follows at once. This will not be like the last time. She will _not_ leave him again.

Through the study down into the treasury room Sparrow goes, and while her speed is no match for Reaver's, her head start makes a difference. The great, ungodly heavy doors to the treasury slam shut in his face and he hears a bar slide into place behind them.

She has to make this difficult. Of course she does.

Reaver doesn't waste time with pleading or begging—not that he ever would intend to. There are a thousand hidden passages in this bloody castle and he is going to see her even if he has to raze through each and every one. Which, if he does not hurry he will have to do. Hence, he presses the barrel of his Dragonstomper to the center of the doors.

He is desperate, rending the wood to splinters with a few blasts and then kicking the broken remnants wide. Desperation does not serve him well, if it has ever done so for anyone. He's prepared to evade fire, ice, lightning, blades made of light, and possibly corpses. Stupidly, so very, very, _very_ stupidly, he forgot her calling card spell, the only one that he knows full well that she will call on in a dire situation.

Maybe because he never thought for a second that she would consider him a dire situation.

_Of course she did_, Robin chides, the first time the fool bird has opened his mouth since Sparrow uttered his name in the tower. _She always knew what you were. You just never pushed her into holding it against you before._

The thought sends another pang of something not-right cleaving through Reaver's innards as Sparrow freezes time.

He realizes, as she approaches, step quick but lacking the key note of panic, that this was a trap. She expected him. Perhaps not tonight but she _knew _he'd be here sooner or later.

Clever as she is lovely, that's his Sparrow. One of his very favorite things about her too. Or so it usually is. When she jabs a wicked looking syringe into his neck and injects its contents into him, he is far less enamored with that shrewdness.

She stops time again and again, just shy of him regaining true momentum, and Reaver is only helpless to watch as she takes his weapons and binds his hands and feet.

"Sparrow," he tries again once she allows time to resume. His vision is blurring at once and his knees are rubber.

"Shh," she waves him off, looking just a bit smug beneath her tightly controlled fury. Her arms are crossed, his Dragonstomper still in hand. It looks ungainly dangling from her fingertips; she is a rifle woman, after all. "Don't worry, darling, it's not poison. Just enjoy your nap."

He would compliment her craftiness but alas, his tongue no longer works. Or his rubber knees. He hits the floor as the world spins and turns dark, Sparrow looming just out of reach.

#

He is naked and tied to a tree with a head that feels as if it has been stuffed with cotton and bees when he comes to. For a moment, Reaver believes that it is still nighttime, what with the area being so very gray and full of shadows. Then the cold and the damp of the air register and upon looking upward, he finds an iron melded sky glutted with doleful clouds.

He knows that he isn't alone, he can feel Sparrow nearby. With a little effort he turns his still pounding head. It is an action that that he comes to regret at once.

_Robin kneels in the bloodied dirt, cradling Oriole's body until it is as cold as the shadowy silence around them. She is beautiful in death, just as she was in life, even with the hole in her chest and the blood dried to her chin._

_He can't move his hands from the death wound. They had always said that they had taken one another's hearts, and Robin had sincerely believed at least in part, that the organ in her chest was his._

_**And now it's been cut out and rent to pieces while hers has grown cold inside of you**__, a terrible, cruel voice coos at the back of his head. __**How very tragically romantic. And useless.**_

"_Shut up," he whispers to the nothingness creeping over him, seeping into his bones. Robin would weep but all of his tears have been spent. Besides he doesn't deserve the relief of crying._

_The voice is right though. It is useless. He is useless. He is dead, his body just hasn't realized it yet._

_**Come now**__, the voice returns. __**Don't be that way. We're free now. We have that.**_

_Robin would argue that he doesn't want freedom or agelessness or physical immunity. But Robin is weak; he has always been weak, and that's all that it takes for him to be squirreled away while Reaver steps forward._

_Reaver stands, still carrying Oriole's lifeless figure. He could leave her here, like the rest of Oakvale, food for carrion, but that won't do. She was __**his**__, after all, and Reaver takes proper care of his belongings._

_He carries her the mile or so to the Clearing. The Nest awaits, freshly painted, its new windows open, to let in a breeze, as if this one spot overlooking such desecration could never be touched. Well, it won't be._

_He lays her out on the parlor settee; against the wine-red cushions she looks more perfect than ever. Reaver smooths back her hair and kisses her forehead before going about his work. Sawing open a hole into the parlor floor so that the cellar is opened, he then hacks through the stone foundation that Oriole, her father, and various siblings had worked so hard to lay. He digs deep, until he has cobbled a hole that's as tall as himself._

_Going upstairs, Reaver begins the tedious process of taking the bed apart then transporting it all down to the hole. Reassembling it is even more tedious but he doesn't rush himself. It isn't like his running out of time now after all. He arranges everything as it was meant to be on Robin and Oriole's wedding night just a month ahead. The embroidered eastern silk sheets bring a smile to his face as he neatly arranges them over the feather tick; Oriole and Robin would have worn these to rags on the very first time._

_Climbing back out of the hole he fills the large copper tub that's in the little room attached to the bedchamber. Someone, probably Dahlia, had already arranged quite a cache of soaps and oils along the walls there. Honeysuckle and violets had always been Oriole's favorite, so those are what he uses after stripping away her gore-caked clothes._

_He takes more time cleaning her corpse than he did with the bed, emptying and then refilling the tub twice, until there isn't a bit of pink in the water. He pats her dry just as thoroughly._

_Her wedding dress, arranged neatly in cupboard all its own, still has pins in it from the last fitting. He removes them; Oriole would rather have an incomplete dress than those sharp little points upon her skin. Wadding bandages into the hole in her chest, Reaver is grateful for the first and only time for the voluminous cowl-neck of the gown that her mother had raved about. Around Oriole's neck go the string of pearls that Robin brought back on his first solo voyage to Bowerstone along with the earrings that had returned with him on his fourth._

_Death and the draining of her blood make her pale and she is paler still in all of that white; it doesn't feel right. Oriole was always dark and nutty standing next to him, now her tawny skin has the pallor of wax. There's nothing to be done about it, though Reaver does paint her face as she would have before attending a party. It helps a bit._

_He draws a bath for himself once she has been taken care of. Reaver scrubs all of the dirt, blood, shame, and regret that is left of Robin right off of his skin and then puts on his predecessor's best clothes._

_Once he has gathered what few things that he will be taking from the remains of Robin's sad, pitiable life, (mostly gold, weapons, and ammunition) he lays Oriole down on the bed, in the hole. The ring she would have worn as Robin's wife is slipped onto her finger and he curls the one she would have given to him into her palm. He lays the cards the old woman gave him at the crossroads with her as well._

_The little fool never deserved anything so perfect, he thinks as he kisses her icy lips for the last time._

_**No. No we didn't**__, Robin agrees._

_Powder kegs were already stored in the cellar; Reaver arranges them just so before knocking over nearly every oil lamp in the Nest and then shooting the last from outside. The Nest burns, then booms, and then crumbles in, creating a proper tomb. Reaver watches it all from beneath the great magnolia tree where Oriole and Robin had carved their names decades ago. He runs his fingers over the scars in the wood as he watches the Nest smolder into cold coals._

_Oriole and Robin. Birds of a Feather. Now and Forever._

There are a few stones, a rudimentary indication that there was once foundation for a home on this cliff-side clearing. Sparrow kneels over it now, almost quite literally walking over her own grave.

"She loved him," she says without looking up. Her fingers keep carding through the grass, picking up pebbles and flicking them from hand to hand. "Even in the end, even when he had destroyed everything that she held dear—even when he destroyed her—she never stopped loving him."

For once, Reaver has no witty remark at hand. For once, all his tongue wants to tell is the truth.

His throat feels like sandpaper when he speaks. "She was a fool then. He was never worthy of her."

Sparrow shakes her head, still focused on something in the grass. "He was what she wanted. The _only_ thing that she wanted. All her life." She glances at him finally, just a side-long, pointed peek. "And he _was_ worthy; but what hope does a puppet have when their strings are in the hands of something so vicious as a prophet?"

A fair point. Perhaps.

"Is this forgiveness then?" he asks.

Sparrow shakes her head. "I'm not her any more than you're still him. Forgiveness for what he did isn't in my power to give any more than it's in your power to accept."

Again, fair point.

"So then, what is this?" he asks, testing the bonds. The ropes are enchanted, he can feel it. There is no way that he would be able to cut through them, even if she had left a knife on his person. "Revenge?"

He says it and is surprised to find that he isn't afraid. It isn't because she couldn't kill him—Sparrow could have ended him a thousand times over. She could do it right now if their positions were reversed because _she_ doesn't need her hands, just a twitch and she can light a blaze, unleash a storm, or freeze time. She has always been his most deadly opponent.

Fear refrains from gnawing at his bones because Reaver knows that while Sparrow could kill him she will not. Not for kindness or love but because of the thing he so admires about her and loathes in the same breath. Killing would be easy and she is smart enough to see that.

Sparrow shakes her head, standing and wiping her hands on the material of her breeches. He notices that she is dressed like she used to in the old days, comfortable leathers and padding. The arms of an adventurer without the responsibility of a crown, of a young woman free to roam the countryside with her mutt.

"This is a warning," she says, and though there is no lightning arcing about her, Reaver knows that she means it.

The wind picks up and her long, dark hair is lifted in the breeze. It halos her head as if she were underwater. For just a moment, as she stands in the rubble of their old lives, ebony hair billowing against the hopeless Wraithmarsh sky, Sparrow and Oriole are both there and _that_ is terrifying.

"You will not seek contact with me, my children, or my court ever again," she tells him. There is steel in her words, unyielding, unbreakable, and uncompromising. If they were a spell, Reaver would be ribbons. "Do what you will in your own affairs so long as you keep anything that might warrant the Crown's intervention well hidden. We will not speak again."

It isn't an unfair bargain, in fact it's one that he himself knows should have been in place decades ago. But the reality…does not sit with him well now. Tiny claws furrow the spaces between his ribs, as if trying to dig a hole from the inside out.

They are his. Sparrow, the boy, and the girl. His and his alone. Love might not be something that he can give them or feel for them, but that does not diminish the fact that Reaver knows _they are his_. And he is not the sort of man who is so weak that he will relinquish his possessions without a fight.

"And if I do not follow Your Majesty's royal edict?" he asks.

Sparrow does not waiver. "Then I will bind and gag you and lay you out before the Shadow Court." She steps closer to him, and he can feel the power inside of her, the potency of her Will, boiling beneath her skin, barely contained by her flesh as it slowly breaks out into swirling blue lines. Like a volcano in the Southern Isles, she could erupt at any moment and destroy the both of them.

Pausing before him, so that there is less than a hand's breadth between them, Sparrow doesn't so much as blink as she continues. "I will wait in that tomb with you for however long it takes, until they know that there is no sacrifice to uphold the bargain."

"And then?" he asks.

"And then I leave whatever is left of you in the darkness where you belong," she says.

Tears run down her cheeks. Like Oriole so many, many years ago, she stands there with her broken heart illuminated in her eyes. Just like Oriole again, she will not be swayed from this course which is yet another mirror upon the paths of their former lives. And as Robin was powerless against temptation (or was it destiny?) so Reaver is powerless against the repercussions of it now.

This is the end. A nearly three-hundred-year-old torch is being snuffed out.

Reaver is surprised when she leans into his restrained form, sobbing a little into his shoulder. His arms itch to pull around her. He settles for ducking his head down to bury in her hair, breathing in her scent. As if he would be able to forget it.

"Do you know the most pathetic thing?" she asks. She doesn't want him to answer so he doesn't. "If it were just me, I wouldn't care."

He stiffens. "You think I would harm _them_?"

To _a_ child, a random, wailing, waddling creature on the streets, Reaver poses an exceptional danger. Not a second thought would be given to shooting one of those things if it were in his way. He hasn't any issue admitting to that either. But Logan and Rosie? No. Never. He would not see them damaged for any price.

_Is that really true? _Robin whispers. _If the Shadow Court offered enough, offered an eternity free worrying from more sacrifices, just for the blood of your offspring, would you be able to tell them no?_

"Yes" doesn't come to mind fast enough. Instead his stomach twists itself tighter than the ropes securing him to the magnolia tree.

She continues on as if she doesn't feel the conflict within his head, remaining steadfastly pressed to him through the barrier of rope. "Robin didn't mean to sacrifice Oriole and their future," she points out, almost calmly. "Yet he did." Sparrow looks up at last, cupping his jaw as she does. He almost can't bear to meet her gaze, so earnestly heartbroken and alone. "I will not risk my son or my daughter to muddied intentions. I've enough to do foiling whatever plot Theresa has designed on them."

He wants to offer his assistance. The Blind Witch used Robin—used _him_ and Reaver cannot let this slight pass. He especially refuses to let her play puppet master with either Rosie or Logan. They at least, will be free of this vicious circle.

Before he can so much as attempt to convey these intentions to Sparrow however, she is kissing him.

Upwards she leans, on the tips of her toes, until their lips brush. Reaver angles his head as best he can, pressing back ferociously. Their last kiss. Salty and sweet and hopeless, the perfect encapsulation of an ill-fated romance spanning two lifetimes.

Sparrow retreats slowly, her whole form trembling with each rapid breath she takes in. Reaver licks his lips, savoring that last taste of her while denying the nigh overwhelming impulse to try and catch another kiss. That would not do either of them any good.

As if she could sense that impulse—which, given how well Sparrow does know him, she rubs her thumb across the apple of his cheek, a thin smile of gratitude flashing through.

"Your things are over there," she nods towards a chest that's been set alongside the tree. "Plus a few silver nitrate torches to get you to Bloodstone." She steps back a pace or two, just out of reach of his arms should they become free. Which, of course, is the next action. Fire dances on her fingertips then whips out, slicing through his bindings. He lurches forward and she disappears.

Standing in the ruins of two lives—or is it four? Just three maybe—Reaver contemplates what he should do next. After a time, he decides that putting on pants is a good enough start.

Then he is going to find a way to knock down a tower and burn a witch.


End file.
